August 12, 2025 • 32 mins
In this episode of the Tech on Toast Podcast, Chris Fletcher welcomes back Dominic Child, VP of Sales at Ingredifind, for a conversation that goes beyond compliance and into the real operational and emotional impact of allergens in hospitality.
Together, they explore why allergen management is still largely manual in a digital-first industry, how it affects staff confidence, guest trust, and operational flow – and how Ingredifind is changing the game.
Dominic explains how their platform tackles the three biggest pain points:
The lack of trust between suppliers and operators
Friction between guests and servers
The burden on staff under pressure to get it right
This isn’t just a conversation about technology — it’s a call to modernise how we handle one of the most sensitive parts of service.
🔥 What You’ll Learn:
Why allergen management is the final digital frontier in hospitality
The operational and reputational risks of ‘just ticking the compliance box’
How self-service allergen tools boost repeat visits by 26% month-on-month
Why training alone won’t solve the problem — and what will
How Ingredifind’s plug-and-play platform works with existing systems
The surprising scale of dietary needs — beyond the ‘top 14’ allergens
📊 Key Stats Mentioned:
74% of customers prefer to self-serve allergen info
30% of adults avoid certain foods due to adverse reactions
40% of diners will avoid restaurants if they can’t view menus in advance
Diagnosed allergies affect 2 million UK adults – with children’s rates even higher
📲 Links & Extras:
🎥 Watch the full webinar demo of Ingredifind’s platform [insert link]
🛍 Visit Ingredifind on the Tech on Toast Marketplace [insert link]
📩 Contact Dom: dchild@ingredifind.com
📌 Coming Soon:
Ingredifind is teasing a major summer announcement that could revolutionise allergen matrices — keep an eye on their LinkedIn for updates.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to the next episode of Tech and Toes Podcast.
And today I'm delighted to be rejoined because we've done
something recently on webinar. Dominic Chard, VP of Sales at
Ingredifying. Dom, how are you?
I'm very well. Thanks, Chris.
Welcome. To Volvos, thank you.
Our new home. It's quite nice, isn't it?
It's very nice. I wouldn't want to be anywhere
else on my wedding anniversary. Oh sure, wedding anniversary.
How good. I'm glad I can play a part in
everyone's life so well, Dom, I mean, if you haven't watched the
(00:23):
webinar yet, it's quite, I mean,it's different because the
webinar is all about the product, right?
And we talked a lot about how the product worked, what it
looks like. And I think I'll put that in the
link of this episode when we finish it so people can see the
product. But tell me before we get into
Ingrid define tell me a little bit about you.
What's brought you to VP of sales here?
You just mentioned that you usedto run around the offices of 4th
on your lunch break. So let's let's go back and
(00:43):
discuss how you got to this point.
Yeah. So I've spent most of my my
professional career in hospitality technology.
So spent eight years at 4th in the sales team there.
So working with menu engineering, inventory,
workforce management solutions. Yes, and me probably at some
point and my colleague shows. Was a great, great 4th customer
and then I moved from there to apoint of sale business and.
(01:08):
Both can't mention them. There were small startups, but
we we had a great time. We grew it over three years and
then sold it to Muse Hotel PMS through COVID, which is
interesting. And and both of those obviously
there's menu engineering at 4th and there was an element to
allergens within point of sale. And so saw the the opportunity
(01:31):
with ingredient and just thoughtit was kind of well overdue
really, you know, one of them. Interesting.
Isn't it? Yeah, and it's one of those,
it's the one thing pretty much in in hospitality that is still
manual. And you know, you've got all
these digital tools and you've got a paper folder next to next
to the till, which is, you know,the folder.
So I think there's real opportunity to restaurants to to
(01:53):
advance their concept when it comes to allergies.
Yeah, it's bizarre, isn't it, that the one thing that kills
people, basically the fact that,you know, in the most extreme
case is the one thing that we don't manage.
And you know, I know there's digital options out there now,
but it is quite recent still, isn't it?
Yep. And, and I have conversations
with operators who say, you know, it's the one thing that
(02:15):
keeps me up at night. But then when you ask, you know,
do you want to see ingridified and how it can help, often they
say, yes, it's not priority at the moment.
Yeah, because it's, you know, they're thinking about labour
costs. I think no, I get it, yeah, and
I'm not dismissing them by laughing it, but I just I think
my my issue with tech and especially around use cases and
(02:35):
where it can help, I think oftenis lost in the the education of
it, the understanding. And it's not saying that people
are stupid. It's about the understanding,
the actual output of what ingredient can do, you know,
products like ingredient defined.
And it's just about ensuring that people are safe and, you
know, and and following through those procedures.
So your team are also safe. And I think it, it just requires
time, right for you to sit with.I imagine when you sit with
(02:56):
someone for a, you know, for a decent period of time, you can
show them the product, explain it, show them what they do.
It's a much higher success rate for you, rather than, I suppose
these quick interactions you have with people where they're
like, I'm just really busy. We just.
Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
And it's the, it's the history of managing allergens as well,
because everyone thinks it's time consuming.
We actually save time in the process.
Yeah, but we also extend the thelevel of their reporting to
(03:19):
their guests. Well, actually I'm digressing as
always. I'm getting so ready.
Tell me about the product. What?
What problem are that you solving with?
Agreed to find? Yeah, sure.
So I think there's there's a lotof friction when it comes to
allergies. So there's friction between
supplier and operator, you know,are they giving me the right
information? Are they putting may contains on
everything? You know, lack of trust.
(03:39):
Sometimes they don't update whenthere's changes made.
Then there's friction between the operator and the guest sat
at the table. And then the operator thinks,
oh, they're just, you know, theyjust don't like something.
They haven't actually got an allergy or so there's a lack of
trust from the guest's perspective.
They're saying, well, you know, just tell me the ingredients
(04:00):
that you're putting in this dish.
And the waiter doesn't know because the chef doesn't know
because it might be from a product.
That delivered as a. Pack exactly.
Yeah. So, so and then they say, well,
why would I bother asking a waiter?
And most restaurants are kind oflinked with compliance and
thinking what these are the boxes I need to tick to be
compliant. So there's there's a load of
(04:21):
friction. So what ingredifying do is, you
know, the purpose is to remove that friction.
So if we can remove the frictionfrom creating a menu in the 1st
place. So we make it easier, quicker
and simpler by saying here's allthe ingredients going into this
dish. And if you want to know the
(04:42):
ingredients, here they are. So and we automatically tag the
allergens based on ingredients. So you're immediately taking a
job away from the operator and, and that part of the job is
often done by people who aren't registered allergists or
dietitians, they're an OPS director or a chef who aren't
qualified in that area. So we do that and we've got a
(05:05):
leading FSA, you know, advisors who who look after our database.
The second part is the friction with the guest sat at the table.
So what we do is via AQR code, you can scan AQR code on on the
menu or click a URL on the website.
And if that customer has a celery allergy, they don't like
(05:26):
coriander and they're vegetarian, for example, that we
can color code the menu to all those specs rather than looking
at 3 items on a matrix and thinking that I can eat that.
Actually, no, I can't eat that because and it's always not
vegetarian. It's so, so the guest experience
becomes that much better. And then the third area we help
(05:47):
is the the staff often with, youknow, current processes, staff
get asked a question and whetherit's one of the main 14 or not,
they often go away and talk to their line manager or the shift
manager or to the chef. And the chef's too busy because,
you know, busy periods. So, so then the waiters
(06:08):
stressed, you know, they, they know that it could be a life and
death situation. So, so it's just, there's,
there's that load of friction there.
So what we also do is provide the staff member a digital tool
via a tablet, which would say you can, it's a slightly
different way of searching, but you can either search by a
(06:29):
specific ingredient or a specific allergy.
Or you could say, actually I'm looking at eating the beetroot
salad. What are the What are the
allergies in there? So it's a really quick and easy
way for the waiter to serve any allergy query at the table.
It's confidence, isn't it? And I think that for me around
allergens, I always think that the resistance, you're so right,
(06:51):
there's so much friction. And actually the way you
described is really clear. We're going to clip that because
it's really cool because it's actually is in those three
stages where there's direction. And I think that that conference
piece is probably one of the biggest.
If I had an allergen or if I wasdining out that I'm not, I'm
probably really wary about eating anywhere and being
confident that that server knowing what I hear on the news
about high churn of employees and people underpaid and all
(07:14):
this kind of so you're already going on the back foot.
So actually knowing that they have that ability to kind of
know what the products are or know what the ingredients are,
that might affect me. That must be one of the bigger
wins you see with the product when people would say like the
immediate wins kind of thing. And everyone's used to saying,
OK, you know, we've got to manage compliance around
allergens. Therefore what do I do of
training more training more, more training.
(07:37):
Actually there's, you know, there's some people who you
physically can't train a menu. Yeah.
And also I don't know if I want to be trained on allergens
unless as in if I'm a so my son is 8 hours a week at Pizza
Pilgrims. He's got, I don't know what they
use actually, but they've got they've got something where he
can get it straight away. So he knows what he's looking
for. And I and I just think, and the
churn, as we mentioned is, you know, it's not just high because
(07:58):
we're bad at our jobs, it's highbecause it's a transient
business, right? There are students coming and
going, there's people doing other jobs and whatnot.
So actually having a way where you don't have to hammer them
over the head with it and just say, look, you can find it at
the table without any education is actually because do you
really want a waiter to have opinion about an allergen, even
if they are educated? I'm just, I'm not sure that the
right way to go, right? And that's kind of what training
(08:19):
does because training is like saying we're going to teach you
what allergens are and what the,you know, the features and
benefits are or whatever what the risks are.
And then the reality is that person may make a decision at
the table and in, you know, halfinformed, would I say.
I mean that that must be one of the regular cases you see.
Yeah. And, and a lot of the training
is, is based around, I mean, there's a one hour training that
(08:41):
would, would qualify that memberof staff to train for a year.
On someone's life. Yeah, and half of that training
is around prepackaged food, which isn't relevant.
Which we're not. Yeah, yeah.
So. So it's just, it's just not.
It's fit for purpose. It feels like it, I'm not being
dismissive, but sometimes with compliance, we have a bit of a
tick box behavior around it. And I saw it all my career,
(09:02):
right, that people just it's done.
It's good enough I suppose is the phrase I'm looking for.
It's good enough to do and we'recovered, you know, So if
something happens bad, and it's not about that now, it's about
servicing like we've done for years through great food.
It's about serving people throughout with allergens who
are also in a community who wantto dine out and don't want to be
ostracized because they have an allergen.
Absolutely. And there's, there's a stat that
(09:23):
74% of customers want to self-serve when it comes to
allergies because it's their it's their personal.
They know they are educators. They know and I don't know about
you. I've, I've been in in, in a
restaurant where you sat down. You've been talking about
someone's individual allergies. Then the waiter comes over and
an example is someone I was eating with said they've got a
dairy allergy and we were talking about it.
(09:45):
Then the waiter came over and said has anyone got any
allergies? And she said no, yeah.
So it's like. Weirdly, because it's my
birthday at the moment. Happy birthday.
Happy birthday. Thanks.
And I don't normally care about my birthday if it's a big one.
So I'm being taken out for dinner a lot and we've been
asked. I was in Liverpool on Saturday
night, I was in at a restaurant in Wales, Cardiff last night.
(10:05):
And both times we were asked that question.
So that the one thing that has changed, I think over the past
five years is that question. Have you got any?
And I know it's compliance, right, But it's but interesting
that I rarely hear the, the after bit.
So, you know, because most time on my table, there's, there's no
allergies over there. No, not that anybody admits
anyway or claims to. So I, I don't know what the
process feels like after that inthe most recent times, but it
(10:27):
still feels like a bit of an awkward conversation.
You know, it still feels like, I've got to say this because
I've been told to and it's really important that I do it,
which is correct. But yeah, it still feels like
we're on that. There's still a bit of a journey
to go and you think in terms of the the way we deliver it.
Yeah, and we've got customers who some of them almost mandate
the responsibility to, to the guest.
(10:49):
And we say, you know, they want to be on CCTV handing over the
allergy menu so that they're covered.
We've got others who want, you know, they, they want 100% of
the waiters to know that there'sanalogy and then they'll go into
the, to the chef to say this person's got a dairy allergy to
make sure, you know, belt and brace his approach.
(11:10):
Our approach is actually, you know, there's layers to the
process along the way. So you want to double down on,
you know, on safety, but actually you've got, you know,
the the guest sat at the table wants to know the ingredients.
You want to generate trust. If it's a if it's an
intolerance, maybe you don't want to mention it to the to the
waiter. Maybe you just maybe you've got
10 intolerances and you just want to pick the best thing.
(11:31):
In which case a self-service option is great.
I think that self-service, that's really because what,
seventy 7474%, yeah. And I think that I I can imagine
that being very accurate if you think about other parts of our
lives where we'd rather just do it ourselves rather than having
to go through what some may think is an embarrassing
conversation with someone, particularly men.
I think men might be 99% in thatcategory if you had to split it
(11:52):
by sex because they just don't want to talk about anything.
And I, and I do wonder if I, I think we should serve that need
of people. They're telling us this is how
we want to be treated. This is how we want to deal with
this problem. And now the tech is good enough
right to do it. Yeah.
And I think it's a bit like when, you know, at the end of a
meal, someone says, how was you know, the waiter says, how was
your meal? I know the tick book.
And, and most, you know, most people, even if it was terrible,
(12:14):
would say, Oh yeah, that's fine.Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's because we're British. We're our own worst enemy,
right? So we don't.
I agree the guest doesn't help the situation either, but I
think in this particular subjectmatter, it doesn't matter.
It doesn't matter who's causing the if you're aware the issue
might be it needs solving and itneed and technology as I always
talk about and I'm posting something this morning about
(12:34):
humility and being great at the table and all this kind of
stuff. But the reality is with certain
things, tech can fix it and at least or take you 90% of that
journey, which we're not achieving.
And if everyone was really on his hand on heart, if you're
running multiple sites, like over 10 sites, can you like
honestly say that we've got it covered?
Yeah, I can go to bed at night. I'm totally confident that it's
(12:55):
covered. And I think the answer's
probably no, You're, you're in it more than me, I imagine and
talking to customers every day. But I imagine that's the that's
the worry that we're not covered.
Yeah. And also it's it makes
operations harder. Yeah.
And you're kind of you're rulingor the compliance is ruling out
lots of elements of the menu andcreate, you know, chef
creativity. So example talking to someone
(13:17):
who had a hazelnut allergy, but compliance just says, have you
got is it, is there tree nuts init or not?
So you're knocking out instead of being able to specify that
person say I've got a hazelnut allergy, give me walnuts all
day, all day long, I'm fine. But they've literally, you know,
restaurants are removing walnutsfrom from everything on the menu
because of the way the government had have stipulated
(13:38):
that compliance should be I. Mean, it sounds so stupid,
doesn't it? But it's, but it is the way that
things work out. And I, and I was going to say
what what is the biggest myth you have around allergens or
ingredient data? What's the one thing you hear
all the time? You kind of not roll your eyes
but think, oh God, it's just nottrue.
The biggest myth? Probably that there's only 14
allergens again because of the the nature of because that's.
(14:00):
Stipulated by. Stipulated in law, but that you
know that I was at 4th at the time when FIR the regulations
FIR 2013 that came out December 2014.
Nothing has changed since then around those 14 allergens.
So, so can you can understand like you know compliance is set
up around the 14, systems are set up around the 14.
(14:22):
It's almost too much hard work to undo it in it, you know, it's
we've done it. We've done, yeah.
But but the thing that is changing is, is demand.
And in the last 20 years, allergens have been increasing
5% per year over those 20 years.So now to the extent and and you
know, I think test at home kits are improving ultra processed
(14:42):
food and meaning more people aregetting allergies.
No one you know you can't. So the diagnosing of your
intolerances, as people may havecalled them in the past that
they're experiencing without anykind of diagnosis is actually
getting clearer, isn't it? People are more aware now of
things that could harm them or, or you know, and as you say, it
might be somewhere on the scale,It might be a very simple
intolerance, but still, you don't want to have it when
you're dining out, right? You don't want to kick it off
(15:04):
because you want to go for dinner.
So that that avoidance of that is becoming more and more common
because more and more and more people know, I suppose.
Yeah. So there's the stat that there's
30% of adults have a food requirement around, you know,
avoiding foods that cause an adverse reaction.
There's a stat that 40% of of adults have a dietary
preference. So vegan, vegetarian,
(15:25):
pescatarian, whatever. So those stats mean that, you
know, restaurants there's a massive opportunity for
restaurants to do it really welland benefit through, you know,
you increase trust, therefore you increase, you increase
repeat visits and therefore increase, increase in sales and.
Which? Yeah, someone doesn't link link
to that compliance piece, no at all.
(15:46):
And I think someone told me a stat about the well, do you know
the size of the community that Isuppose I hate calling it the
allergen community because that's not really fair.
But the amount of people that have allergens or could be
serviced that we're not servicing very well, I suppose
at the moment. Is there?
Is there a stat around that? There's, yeah, there's a stat of
diagnosed, like medically diagnosed allergies, which is 2
(16:08):
million adults in the UK. But then, then there's the
intolerances on top of that in children, there's the number of
allergies is double. But you kind of, if you talk to,
I think if you talk to restaurants about, you know, a
number of, you know, 1% might have an egg allergy and they
get, well, it's only 1%. But if you add up all the
(16:30):
allergies, there's, you know, there's the 14 compliant ones,
but there's, depending on who you talk to, again, it varies,
but between 170 and 230 foods create an adverse reaction in
the, in the body. So, so you've got the, you know,
230 opportunities of, of giving much better information, which
(16:50):
doesn't relate to the 14 at all.The 14 are the main ones, but
you could go way in a way beyondthat to give a great guest
experience and give guests what they need to know.
It's a no, I mean, for me it's, I mean, I don't own a budget
anymore, but it's a no brainer to me, right, Because it's just
like you, you're and if you wantto talk about ticking boxes,
you're definitely ticking a box in a in a really positive way
(17:11):
where you have ultimate confidence.
And the one thing I'll talk about tech recently is people
saying that robots are better atsome things than humans.
Unfortunately, it's just the wayit is, you know, in terms of
consistency delivery and be ableto be accurate every time that
we they are better than us at this stuff.
And I think the, where you look at tech replacing people or
aiding people, that's where we need it in these circumstances
where what me and you might hearin a staff meeting, we, we both
(17:35):
will deliver in a different way at the table.
We just will depending on our relationship with the table that
day, that morning or that night.And that is how risky it is
because just by nature you'll be, you'll find a different, you
know, rapport with the customer,whatever you're talking, some
might you say, we'll say nothing, some will give you
everything. So, and how do you diagnose
that? And the easiest way to do it is
just say, just use that, Yeah, because it's just safer.
(17:57):
It's just And what, what kind offeedback do you get from the?
So once you're in and you're andthey've seen the light, what
what is the what, what, what kind of reaction do you get from
the? Operators so really positive,
you know, every single point. That was a stupid question.
It's awful, Chris. No, in all honesty, it's you
know, it's, it's been really positive every single business.
(18:18):
We some do a Big Bang approach and just put it in every, in
every site. Some are a bit more cautious,
but when they do put it in very quickly they roll out so they
see, you know, operational benefits of, you know, time
saved from the waiters. I think often it's they're
concerned about the the size of the project and they delay it,
(18:39):
you know, to put it behind an EPOS project or an.
Invention. Is it like open heart surgery?
Like no. That's why I always talk about
saying, you know, like taking a pause out or taking workforce
management out or something. This is less in what's the word
invasive. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Very much so. So I don't know the medical
comparison, but things. Fine, what would be great, just
do that all the way through the episode.
(19:00):
But yeah. So like, yeah, obviously with my
experience with inventory and point of sale, typically those
projects, you know, you're dealing with hardware in some
situations you're dealing with, you know, the whole kind of
supply chain and purchase to payand so forth.
And they typically take, you know, certainly north of the
month, but kind of two to three months to implement depending on
(19:22):
the size of the estate we set up.
We can set up like one site in one day.
Most, most projects, depending on the number of menus they
have, we would say between one to two weeks.
And in those one to two weeks, we are basically doing 95% of
the work. So if someone comes to me and
says I'm really interested in what you're doing, we would say
(19:43):
just give me a log into your inventory solution or give us
your catalog. Sometimes it's a log into an
inventory solution, sometimes it's scribbled on the back of a
packet and we can take all that information and give their
customers the ingredient information based on what we're
given. So you guys do all the heavy
lifting in that we. Do all the heavy lifting.
Yeah, very cool. And in an existing tech stack,
(20:06):
you just alludes to a little bitthere.
You're amongst obviously Paul's inventory.
I'm trying to think where else you would do you need to plug in
anywhere else or maybe into HR alittle bit?
No, no. No, no, no.
We, we could go into loyalty apps.
Some of our customers have got them all the loyalty apps so but
again, that's just exposing so you're.
Part of the text that rather than taking over like a major
part, you'll fit into the other guys.
Then you've got. I presume you integrate into
(20:27):
most. Yeah.
So we've got a couple of announcements coming up about
new integrations, but we can, wecan take him like information
from from anywhere. The important thing would be the
level of that information. So with inventory solutions, you
know, do they, can they expose ingredient level information to
give the best service? If, if not, we can, we can
(20:49):
we're, we're still sharing information from a dish level to
the to the guest at the at the table.
But if if that solution can't break it down by ingredients, we
can't give that information to the to the guest.
So, yeah. So it's, yeah, it's still key
where you sit in the middle of it, isn't it?
Because you need that. Well, to make it more as
effective as can be, you need that data, right?
(21:10):
Community system, yeah. But some, but because of that
some, some of our customers say actually we want it stand alone
because then we can you know, we're sharing and and then you
take out allergens from an inventory solution and just have
it in Ingrid defined. So it just depends on where the
master data sits. And, and how and how are you
perceived, I suppose like, you know, when you're going in, I
suppose if you're cold call someone or if you just meet
(21:32):
someone for the first time, is it we talked about a little bit
at the start is, is there a welcoming of old?
You were saying people are quitereceptive to the fact that they
know they need to address this problem.
But there, there's still a gap is there where you think that
people are not executing on it yet it's lower down the
priority. This is that.
Would that be fair to say? Yeah, I think, I think you know,
certainly at the moment with thethe April budget, there's a lot
(21:53):
of pressure. To hangover there, definitely.
Yes, there's a definite hangover.
And, you know, and if people arethinking about, you know, adding
new sites or selling sites or struggling financially or, you
know, the labour costs, I get it.
I can understand why that's a priority.
That's true. And then it's then then it's my
job to to convince them about the speed of the project and
say, look, actually, if you've got a load of things on your
(22:15):
plate, allergies, most people say that's the thing that keeps
them up at night. Yeah, so let me take that off
your plate with our allergy, youknow, registered allergists and
dietitians. And we do all the heavy lifting
like you say. What I wouldn't call it heavy
lifting, I'd call it light lifting because we make it easy
and we do 95%. And then all we're saying is,
you know, if you've you tell me there's Worcestershire sauce in
(22:38):
this, in this recipe, is that Liam Perrins or something else?
And then we get the ingredients from that, that product and, and
make it right in their, in theirdishes.
So, so really from the operator side, it's, it's a few questions
just for us to clarify ingredients and then we hand
over the tool and then it's so easy to use that is they can
(22:59):
manage and maintain. Well, I've been on it.
I've seen. Yeah, obviously we did the
webinar, we went through the product and I thought it was
really seamless. And in fact, one of the things I
loved about is that, like you said, the speed of getting to
what the issue is, rather than having to either fan through a
book or even actually on some ofthe original tech that came out
around allergens. This is bad because you're going
straight to the ingredient and you can actually see straight
away, or that's my, my particular issue is this one
(23:21):
ingredient and I can get straight to that and it knocks
out half the menu or it knocks out whatever dishes that I'm on.
So, and I think that's the real win.
Very quickly, what about transparency generally?
Do you think on a on a, with allergens, generally, are you
seeing a movement forward? I know that there's obviously
more people now in technology looking to address this problem,
and obviously there's been a statue come out around allergens
(23:42):
in the workplace, in the restaurant.
Sorry. And explain how we should deal
with them. Do you think there's enough
transparency still? We still got a bit of a way to
go in terms of people talking openly about allergens and how
we should deal with them. Yeah, I think pretty much, you
know, most of the industry are going back to the compliance
point. Most, most of the industry is
still set up around compliance. And because of that, you know,
(24:03):
it's, there's, there's a bit of a fear, you know, more
legislation will come. You know, there's, there's talk
about extending that to, to more, in more allergens.
We've already extended the 14 upto 21 allergens because we see
the net, you know, the most popular next ones through,
through the data that we see through usage.
But then the transparency is again going back to existing
(24:26):
tech stacks. It's limited to, to, to the tech
and the tech limits the transparency to the dish, not to
the ingredients. And that's what we kind of
unravel and expose to to the guest at the table because like
you say, you know, if I've got an allergy to egg white but not
egg yolk, I can search for that in.
(24:47):
A dish, it's convenience as well, right?
I think this comes back to convenience and the way we
behave around retail shopping, everything else.
Now, we want things quick and wewant to know quickly.
And I think obviously people allergens will behave
differently because they've beenmade to, because there's a risk
around what they're doing. But actually, I think that they
want speed of service. They still want to be treated
like everybody else in the restaurant.
They don't care. And if they can do it themselves
(25:07):
without disturbing the rest of their colleagues or friends
around dinner, I think they'd. And I'm unfortunately, I'm
talking behalf, Valerie, people are not one of them.
But I imagine that would be if it was me.
Definitely. I'd prefer that.
I'd prefer to be able to take the problem into my hands, sort
it out quite quickly without having to have a conversation
and have the awkward bit where everyone's looking at me going,
oh, yeah, I can have that, but Ican't have this.
And I don't want, you know, it'sjust awkward.
(25:29):
Yeah, they just and it's and youknow, the worst thing about it's
the start of the meal. So like for any restaurant or
listening, if you're starting every experience in your
restaurant like that with a withthat weird question going, you
know, you know, And then when the response is, yes, I have.
And the waiter looks like dread just appears in their face.
That's the start of someone's experience.
It's about to give you 4 hundred, £500 or whatever it
(25:51):
might be, depending on how many people are there.
But I just find that, yeah, I just, it's not easy.
Don't get me wrong, it's not easy for anybody, but I think if
you can address it, why wouldn'tyou?
Yeah, I just. Yeah, I find it.
It's baffling for me. But look what I suppose we
talked a little bit about transparency, but what do you
see in this space going forward?What do you think?
Especially if you agree to find.Are you guys developing more
ways to, I suppose help people? Yeah.
(26:12):
Well, I mean the the first levelis is kind of moving away from
compliance or not away from it, but over and above compliance,
so. Superseding it?
Almost, yes. Absolutely.
So, so the guest to demand we know is there.
So one of one of our best stats is that on average across all
our customer base, we we track repeat visits.
So if someone goes in and scans and agree to find QR code, we
(26:35):
know that device when it goes back, you know, in the coming
months and we see repeat visits on average are 26% month by
month, and that's against an industry average of about 6%.
It's really cool. So, and that's all about the
trust. So when someone goes in and they
think, wow, I can see every single ingredient in the in the
(26:55):
dishes I'm I'm choosing and those those people spend more
because I think actually, I'm not going to limit myself to and
they're. Going to bring more people with
them. Right.
And they bring their friends. So, so if, if one in three have
an allergy or an intolerance or,or the 40% with, with
preferences, if the average booking is, you know, three
people per table, you've basically got one person on each
(27:17):
in, in each booking who, who will be using and gridified or
will have a, a need. And then if those are the people
who are driving where the bookings go, that it drives a
lot of sales. So, so I think the more you
know, businesses that adopt thisingredient level of approach as
opposed to the allergen compliance approach, the the
(27:39):
more people will start to realize that actually compliance
is limiting sales. And actually what going over and
above and and addressing the guest experience will drive,
will drive sales and benefit therestaurant as opposed to being,
you know, a bit of a pain and it's hard to manage.
And it's, you know, government telling me what to do, which is
(28:00):
all negative. And, you know, which has been
the same, you know. It's actually a bit like food
safety in a way. I don't want to get too much
into this, but food safety has alevel of compliance, obviously,
and you have your ratings and whatnot.
But I worked for colleges and Hard Rock for about 15 years of
my career and they were both obsessed with but not food
standard. They didn't call it for.
They were accessible hygiene, full stop.
(28:20):
And they had a really high standard above and beyond what
you would have to do to get 3 or4 stars, 5 stars, whatever.
And it made us better like as a group, as an individual, as AGM,
whoever it was, it made us better because we just went
beyond what was ruled, you know,what was told, we were told to
do. And I think we should, if you
can achieve that in every level of your business, or, or at
least aim to achieve that in every level of business, you be,
(28:42):
you do become world class. You do become like a bit of a, a
bit of a, a winner in that, in that group, because no one can
compete with that. It's very hard to compete with
people who are obsessed with being top in everything.
And I, I do just think that whenpeople look at their choices
around technology they're using or the way they follow
compliance or whatever they might be doing, I think just
look at that. Just go above the bar a little
bit. Yeah.
(29:03):
Just help yourselves out becauselike you said, there's a,
there's a community here waitingto be looked after.
Yeah. They're going to bring their
mates, they're going to come back. 26% more or 20% more than
a regular customer. I yeah, all the indicators point
to yes. So for me it just makes.
Sense, yeah, and there's such. And I don't work from
gridifying, by the way, just to say this, but I just think this
particular problem we're quite passionate about.
But yeah. Yeah, and there's such a,
(29:24):
there's so many kind of gaps or opportunities.
So for example, you know, some some stats, there's 25% of
adults with kids with allergies refused to take to eat out
because they're too worried about their kids.
So they just don't go out. 40% won't visit. 40% of people with
an allergy don't visit a restaurant if they can't see the
(29:44):
menu in advance. So there's loads of all these
wins that if by, you know, having an ingredient filter on
the menu to say actually here's all the ingredients and you
know, you can pick out what you want to eat beforehand, you're
going to encourage people to. Go as an apparent example of if
one of my three had that yeah, 100% we would be I mean Uber
cautious. I mean that my youngest is
(30:05):
autistic so and we're already cautious about him right Just
what environment we put him in so do we want to put him in a we
don't want to offend at the diner.
We don't want to upset at the diners, you know if he has a
little tantrum or whatever. So we can we try and keep we
we're already conscious about where we die.
I can't even imagine what it's like if you've got something
that would affect you personallyor your child.
So yeah, obviously drives decision making.
So look, I mean, yeah, I think it's very, very interesting Don
(30:28):
we've got obviously I've got thewebinar, which we'll share with
this podcast episode as well. How do people get hold of you if
they're interested in finding out more about angry define?
So the best way would be my emails.
D child at angrydefine.com or find me on LinkedIn.
We will also be We've got some quite big things coming up.
Do you want to talk about them? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Far away. Sorry you're off in your.
(30:49):
Prime No, that's right. We get it.
We. I can't do too much, but we've
got you. Can't do that.
You can't offer it up and then pull it back.
Carry on. We've got a few integrations
coming up which we're really excited about what we're, we're
building towards a model of almost like touchless allergen
management. So from the supply chain of
ingredient information coming almost automated via via AI and
(31:14):
linking with suppliers. We've got through 28 minutes for
that AI, but there you go. Yeah, it is.
It's true. There's AI to a point.
No, no, no. It's going to be part of our
makeup, right? So.
Yeah. And and then we're, we're, if
you anyone what I would say anyone using an allergy matrix
in restaurants, follow us on LinkedIn because there's, I
(31:34):
can't say too much, but there's going to be an announcement of
what we, what we will do to makethose operators lives an awful
lot easier. When's that going to be?
We we hope in about 3 to 4 weeks.
OK, I'm going to say I'm going to say July about right.
Yeah, well, yeah, about right. OK, we'll just the summer.
Summer holidays. It is tackle iterations will
(31:57):
happen, I'm sure. OK, that's that's really
exciting. OK, well, I'll make sure that we
put that in the copy as well to tell people to keep their eye
out. But brilliant, Dom nice to chat
to you again. Appreciate what you guys are
doing. And I think it's I think you're
leading, leading a bit of a battle out there.
And I think it's I think it's one that needs to be won.
So good luck to that. And anybody who's listening
wants to get in touch. You can find Dom on the
marketplace as well. And great to find.
(32:18):
And yeah, and we shall see you all next week.
Say bye Dom. Bye bye.
Thank you.
Welcome to the next episode of Tech and Toes Podcast.
And today I'm delighted to be rejoined because we've done
something recently on webinar. Dominic Chard, VP of Sales at
Ingredifying. Dom, how are you?
I'm very well. Thanks, Chris.
Welcome. To Volvos, thank you.
Our new home. It's quite nice, isn't it?
It's very nice. I wouldn't want to be anywhere
else on my wedding anniversary. Oh sure, wedding anniversary.
How good. I'm glad I can play a part in
everyone's life so well, Dom, I mean, if you haven't watched the
(00:23):
webinar yet, it's quite, I mean,it's different because the
webinar is all about the product, right?
And we talked a lot about how the product worked, what it
looks like. And I think I'll put that in the
link of this episode when we finish it so people can see the
product. But tell me before we get into
Ingrid define tell me a little bit about you.
What's brought you to VP of sales here?
You just mentioned that you usedto run around the offices of 4th
on your lunch break. So let's let's go back and
(00:43):
discuss how you got to this point.
Yeah. So I've spent most of my my
professional career in hospitality technology.
So spent eight years at 4th in the sales team there.
So working with menu engineering, inventory,
workforce management solutions. Yes, and me probably at some
point and my colleague shows. Was a great, great 4th customer
and then I moved from there to apoint of sale business and.
(01:08):
Both can't mention them. There were small startups, but
we we had a great time. We grew it over three years and
then sold it to Muse Hotel PMS through COVID, which is
interesting. And and both of those obviously
there's menu engineering at 4th and there was an element to
allergens within point of sale. And so saw the the opportunity
(01:31):
with ingredient and just thoughtit was kind of well overdue
really, you know, one of them. Interesting.
Isn't it? Yeah, and it's one of those,
it's the one thing pretty much in in hospitality that is still
manual. And you know, you've got all
these digital tools and you've got a paper folder next to next
to the till, which is, you know,the folder.
So I think there's real opportunity to restaurants to to
(01:53):
advance their concept when it comes to allergies.
Yeah, it's bizarre, isn't it, that the one thing that kills
people, basically the fact that,you know, in the most extreme
case is the one thing that we don't manage.
And you know, I know there's digital options out there now,
but it is quite recent still, isn't it?
Yep. And, and I have conversations
with operators who say, you know, it's the one thing that
(02:15):
keeps me up at night. But then when you ask, you know,
do you want to see ingridified and how it can help, often they
say, yes, it's not priority at the moment.
Yeah, because it's, you know, they're thinking about labour
costs. I think no, I get it, yeah, and
I'm not dismissing them by laughing it, but I just I think
my my issue with tech and especially around use cases and
(02:35):
where it can help, I think oftenis lost in the the education of
it, the understanding. And it's not saying that people
are stupid. It's about the understanding,
the actual output of what ingredient can do, you know,
products like ingredient defined.
And it's just about ensuring that people are safe and, you
know, and and following through those procedures.
So your team are also safe. And I think it, it just requires
time, right for you to sit with.I imagine when you sit with
(02:56):
someone for a, you know, for a decent period of time, you can
show them the product, explain it, show them what they do.
It's a much higher success rate for you, rather than, I suppose
these quick interactions you have with people where they're
like, I'm just really busy. We just.
Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
And it's the, it's the history of managing allergens as well,
because everyone thinks it's time consuming.
We actually save time in the process.
Yeah, but we also extend the thelevel of their reporting to
(03:19):
their guests. Well, actually I'm digressing as
always. I'm getting so ready.
Tell me about the product. What?
What problem are that you solving with?
Agreed to find? Yeah, sure.
So I think there's there's a lotof friction when it comes to
allergies. So there's friction between
supplier and operator, you know,are they giving me the right
information? Are they putting may contains on
everything? You know, lack of trust.
(03:39):
Sometimes they don't update whenthere's changes made.
Then there's friction between the operator and the guest sat
at the table. And then the operator thinks,
oh, they're just, you know, theyjust don't like something.
They haven't actually got an allergy or so there's a lack of
trust from the guest's perspective.
They're saying, well, you know, just tell me the ingredients
(04:00):
that you're putting in this dish.
And the waiter doesn't know because the chef doesn't know
because it might be from a product.
That delivered as a. Pack exactly.
Yeah. So, so and then they say, well,
why would I bother asking a waiter?
And most restaurants are kind oflinked with compliance and
thinking what these are the boxes I need to tick to be
compliant. So there's there's a load of
(04:21):
friction. So what ingredifying do is, you
know, the purpose is to remove that friction.
So if we can remove the frictionfrom creating a menu in the 1st
place. So we make it easier, quicker
and simpler by saying here's allthe ingredients going into this
dish. And if you want to know the
(04:42):
ingredients, here they are. So and we automatically tag the
allergens based on ingredients. So you're immediately taking a
job away from the operator and, and that part of the job is
often done by people who aren't registered allergists or
dietitians, they're an OPS director or a chef who aren't
qualified in that area. So we do that and we've got a
(05:05):
leading FSA, you know, advisors who who look after our database.
The second part is the friction with the guest sat at the table.
So what we do is via AQR code, you can scan AQR code on on the
menu or click a URL on the website.
And if that customer has a celery allergy, they don't like
(05:26):
coriander and they're vegetarian, for example, that we
can color code the menu to all those specs rather than looking
at 3 items on a matrix and thinking that I can eat that.
Actually, no, I can't eat that because and it's always not
vegetarian. It's so, so the guest experience
becomes that much better. And then the third area we help
(05:47):
is the the staff often with, youknow, current processes, staff
get asked a question and whetherit's one of the main 14 or not,
they often go away and talk to their line manager or the shift
manager or to the chef. And the chef's too busy because,
you know, busy periods. So, so then the waiters
(06:08):
stressed, you know, they, they know that it could be a life and
death situation. So, so it's just, there's,
there's that load of friction there.
So what we also do is provide the staff member a digital tool
via a tablet, which would say you can, it's a slightly
different way of searching, but you can either search by a
(06:29):
specific ingredient or a specific allergy.
Or you could say, actually I'm looking at eating the beetroot
salad. What are the What are the
allergies in there? So it's a really quick and easy
way for the waiter to serve any allergy query at the table.
It's confidence, isn't it? And I think that for me around
allergens, I always think that the resistance, you're so right,
(06:51):
there's so much friction. And actually the way you
described is really clear. We're going to clip that because
it's really cool because it's actually is in those three
stages where there's direction. And I think that that conference
piece is probably one of the biggest.
If I had an allergen or if I wasdining out that I'm not, I'm
probably really wary about eating anywhere and being
confident that that server knowing what I hear on the news
about high churn of employees and people underpaid and all
(07:14):
this kind of so you're already going on the back foot.
So actually knowing that they have that ability to kind of
know what the products are or know what the ingredients are,
that might affect me. That must be one of the bigger
wins you see with the product when people would say like the
immediate wins kind of thing. And everyone's used to saying,
OK, you know, we've got to manage compliance around
allergens. Therefore what do I do of
training more training more, more training.
(07:37):
Actually there's, you know, there's some people who you
physically can't train a menu. Yeah.
And also I don't know if I want to be trained on allergens
unless as in if I'm a so my son is 8 hours a week at Pizza
Pilgrims. He's got, I don't know what they
use actually, but they've got they've got something where he
can get it straight away. So he knows what he's looking
for. And I and I just think, and the
churn, as we mentioned is, you know, it's not just high because
(07:58):
we're bad at our jobs, it's highbecause it's a transient
business, right? There are students coming and
going, there's people doing other jobs and whatnot.
So actually having a way where you don't have to hammer them
over the head with it and just say, look, you can find it at
the table without any education is actually because do you
really want a waiter to have opinion about an allergen, even
if they are educated? I'm just, I'm not sure that the
right way to go, right? And that's kind of what training
(08:19):
does because training is like saying we're going to teach you
what allergens are and what the,you know, the features and
benefits are or whatever what the risks are.
And then the reality is that person may make a decision at
the table and in, you know, halfinformed, would I say.
I mean that that must be one of the regular cases you see.
Yeah. And, and a lot of the training
is, is based around, I mean, there's a one hour training that
(08:41):
would, would qualify that memberof staff to train for a year.
On someone's life. Yeah, and half of that training
is around prepackaged food, which isn't relevant.
Which we're not. Yeah, yeah.
So. So it's just, it's just not.
It's fit for purpose. It feels like it, I'm not being
dismissive, but sometimes with compliance, we have a bit of a
tick box behavior around it. And I saw it all my career,
(09:02):
right, that people just it's done.
It's good enough I suppose is the phrase I'm looking for.
It's good enough to do and we'recovered, you know, So if
something happens bad, and it's not about that now, it's about
servicing like we've done for years through great food.
It's about serving people throughout with allergens who
are also in a community who wantto dine out and don't want to be
ostracized because they have an allergen.
Absolutely. And there's, there's a stat that
(09:23):
74% of customers want to self-serve when it comes to
allergies because it's their it's their personal.
They know they are educators. They know and I don't know about
you. I've, I've been in in, in a
restaurant where you sat down. You've been talking about
someone's individual allergies. Then the waiter comes over and
an example is someone I was eating with said they've got a
dairy allergy and we were talking about it.
(09:45):
Then the waiter came over and said has anyone got any
allergies? And she said no, yeah.
So it's like. Weirdly, because it's my
birthday at the moment. Happy birthday.
Happy birthday. Thanks.
And I don't normally care about my birthday if it's a big one.
So I'm being taken out for dinner a lot and we've been
asked. I was in Liverpool on Saturday
night, I was in at a restaurant in Wales, Cardiff last night.
(10:05):
And both times we were asked that question.
So that the one thing that has changed, I think over the past
five years is that question. Have you got any?
And I know it's compliance, right, But it's but interesting
that I rarely hear the, the after bit.
So, you know, because most time on my table, there's, there's no
allergies over there. No, not that anybody admits
anyway or claims to. So I, I don't know what the
process feels like after that inthe most recent times, but it
(10:27):
still feels like a bit of an awkward conversation.
You know, it still feels like, I've got to say this because
I've been told to and it's really important that I do it,
which is correct. But yeah, it still feels like
we're on that. There's still a bit of a journey
to go and you think in terms of the the way we deliver it.
Yeah, and we've got customers who some of them almost mandate
the responsibility to, to the guest.
(10:49):
And we say, you know, they want to be on CCTV handing over the
allergy menu so that they're covered.
We've got others who want, you know, they, they want 100% of
the waiters to know that there'sanalogy and then they'll go into
the, to the chef to say this person's got a dairy allergy to
make sure, you know, belt and brace his approach.
(11:10):
Our approach is actually, you know, there's layers to the
process along the way. So you want to double down on,
you know, on safety, but actually you've got, you know,
the the guest sat at the table wants to know the ingredients.
You want to generate trust. If it's a if it's an
intolerance, maybe you don't want to mention it to the to the
waiter. Maybe you just maybe you've got
10 intolerances and you just want to pick the best thing.
(11:31):
In which case a self-service option is great.
I think that self-service, that's really because what,
seventy 7474%, yeah. And I think that I I can imagine
that being very accurate if you think about other parts of our
lives where we'd rather just do it ourselves rather than having
to go through what some may think is an embarrassing
conversation with someone, particularly men.
I think men might be 99% in thatcategory if you had to split it
(11:52):
by sex because they just don't want to talk about anything.
And I, and I do wonder if I, I think we should serve that need
of people. They're telling us this is how
we want to be treated. This is how we want to deal with
this problem. And now the tech is good enough
right to do it. Yeah.
And I think it's a bit like when, you know, at the end of a
meal, someone says, how was you know, the waiter says, how was
your meal? I know the tick book.
And, and most, you know, most people, even if it was terrible,
(12:14):
would say, Oh yeah, that's fine.Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's because we're British. We're our own worst enemy,
right? So we don't.
I agree the guest doesn't help the situation either, but I
think in this particular subjectmatter, it doesn't matter.
It doesn't matter who's causing the if you're aware the issue
might be it needs solving and itneed and technology as I always
talk about and I'm posting something this morning about
(12:34):
humility and being great at the table and all this kind of
stuff. But the reality is with certain
things, tech can fix it and at least or take you 90% of that
journey, which we're not achieving.
And if everyone was really on his hand on heart, if you're
running multiple sites, like over 10 sites, can you like
honestly say that we've got it covered?
Yeah, I can go to bed at night. I'm totally confident that it's
(12:55):
covered. And I think the answer's
probably no, You're, you're in it more than me, I imagine and
talking to customers every day. But I imagine that's the that's
the worry that we're not covered.
Yeah. And also it's it makes
operations harder. Yeah.
And you're kind of you're rulingor the compliance is ruling out
lots of elements of the menu andcreate, you know, chef
creativity. So example talking to someone
(13:17):
who had a hazelnut allergy, but compliance just says, have you
got is it, is there tree nuts init or not?
So you're knocking out instead of being able to specify that
person say I've got a hazelnut allergy, give me walnuts all
day, all day long, I'm fine. But they've literally, you know,
restaurants are removing walnutsfrom from everything on the menu
because of the way the government had have stipulated
(13:38):
that compliance should be I. Mean, it sounds so stupid,
doesn't it? But it's, but it is the way that
things work out. And I, and I was going to say
what what is the biggest myth you have around allergens or
ingredient data? What's the one thing you hear
all the time? You kind of not roll your eyes
but think, oh God, it's just nottrue.
The biggest myth? Probably that there's only 14
allergens again because of the the nature of because that's.
(14:00):
Stipulated by. Stipulated in law, but that you
know that I was at 4th at the time when FIR the regulations
FIR 2013 that came out December 2014.
Nothing has changed since then around those 14 allergens.
So, so can you can understand like you know compliance is set
up around the 14, systems are set up around the 14.
(14:22):
It's almost too much hard work to undo it in it, you know, it's
we've done it. We've done, yeah.
But but the thing that is changing is, is demand.
And in the last 20 years, allergens have been increasing
5% per year over those 20 years.So now to the extent and and you
know, I think test at home kits are improving ultra processed
(14:42):
food and meaning more people aregetting allergies.
No one you know you can't. So the diagnosing of your
intolerances, as people may havecalled them in the past that
they're experiencing without anykind of diagnosis is actually
getting clearer, isn't it? People are more aware now of
things that could harm them or, or you know, and as you say, it
might be somewhere on the scale,It might be a very simple
intolerance, but still, you don't want to have it when
you're dining out, right? You don't want to kick it off
(15:04):
because you want to go for dinner.
So that that avoidance of that is becoming more and more common
because more and more and more people know, I suppose.
Yeah. So there's the stat that there's
30% of adults have a food requirement around, you know,
avoiding foods that cause an adverse reaction.
There's a stat that 40% of of adults have a dietary
preference. So vegan, vegetarian,
(15:25):
pescatarian, whatever. So those stats mean that, you
know, restaurants there's a massive opportunity for
restaurants to do it really welland benefit through, you know,
you increase trust, therefore you increase, you increase
repeat visits and therefore increase, increase in sales and.
Which? Yeah, someone doesn't link link
to that compliance piece, no at all.
(15:46):
And I think someone told me a stat about the well, do you know
the size of the community that Isuppose I hate calling it the
allergen community because that's not really fair.
But the amount of people that have allergens or could be
serviced that we're not servicing very well, I suppose
at the moment. Is there?
Is there a stat around that? There's, yeah, there's a stat of
diagnosed, like medically diagnosed allergies, which is 2
(16:08):
million adults in the UK. But then, then there's the
intolerances on top of that in children, there's the number of
allergies is double. But you kind of, if you talk to,
I think if you talk to restaurants about, you know, a
number of, you know, 1% might have an egg allergy and they
get, well, it's only 1%. But if you add up all the
(16:30):
allergies, there's, you know, there's the 14 compliant ones,
but there's, depending on who you talk to, again, it varies,
but between 170 and 230 foods create an adverse reaction in
the, in the body. So, so you've got the, you know,
230 opportunities of, of giving much better information, which
(16:50):
doesn't relate to the 14 at all.The 14 are the main ones, but
you could go way in a way beyondthat to give a great guest
experience and give guests what they need to know.
It's a no, I mean, for me it's, I mean, I don't own a budget
anymore, but it's a no brainer to me, right, Because it's just
like you, you're and if you wantto talk about ticking boxes,
you're definitely ticking a box in a in a really positive way
(17:11):
where you have ultimate confidence.
And the one thing I'll talk about tech recently is people
saying that robots are better atsome things than humans.
Unfortunately, it's just the wayit is, you know, in terms of
consistency delivery and be ableto be accurate every time that
we they are better than us at this stuff.
And I think the, where you look at tech replacing people or
aiding people, that's where we need it in these circumstances
where what me and you might hearin a staff meeting, we, we both
(17:35):
will deliver in a different way at the table.
We just will depending on our relationship with the table that
day, that morning or that night.And that is how risky it is
because just by nature you'll be, you'll find a different, you
know, rapport with the customer,whatever you're talking, some
might you say, we'll say nothing, some will give you
everything. So, and how do you diagnose
that? And the easiest way to do it is
just say, just use that, Yeah, because it's just safer.
(17:57):
It's just And what, what kind offeedback do you get from the?
So once you're in and you're andthey've seen the light, what
what is the what, what, what kind of reaction do you get from
the? Operators so really positive,
you know, every single point. That was a stupid question.
It's awful, Chris. No, in all honesty, it's you
know, it's, it's been really positive every single business.
(18:18):
We some do a Big Bang approach and just put it in every, in
every site. Some are a bit more cautious,
but when they do put it in very quickly they roll out so they
see, you know, operational benefits of, you know, time
saved from the waiters. I think often it's they're
concerned about the the size of the project and they delay it,
(18:39):
you know, to put it behind an EPOS project or an.
Invention. Is it like open heart surgery?
Like no. That's why I always talk about
saying, you know, like taking a pause out or taking workforce
management out or something. This is less in what's the word
invasive. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Very much so. So I don't know the medical
comparison, but things. Fine, what would be great, just
do that all the way through the episode.
(19:00):
But yeah. So like, yeah, obviously with my
experience with inventory and point of sale, typically those
projects, you know, you're dealing with hardware in some
situations you're dealing with, you know, the whole kind of
supply chain and purchase to payand so forth.
And they typically take, you know, certainly north of the
month, but kind of two to three months to implement depending on
(19:22):
the size of the estate we set up.
We can set up like one site in one day.
Most, most projects, depending on the number of menus they
have, we would say between one to two weeks.
And in those one to two weeks, we are basically doing 95% of
the work. So if someone comes to me and
says I'm really interested in what you're doing, we would say
(19:43):
just give me a log into your inventory solution or give us
your catalog. Sometimes it's a log into an
inventory solution, sometimes it's scribbled on the back of a
packet and we can take all that information and give their
customers the ingredient information based on what we're
given. So you guys do all the heavy
lifting in that we. Do all the heavy lifting.
Yeah, very cool. And in an existing tech stack,
(20:06):
you just alludes to a little bitthere.
You're amongst obviously Paul's inventory.
I'm trying to think where else you would do you need to plug in
anywhere else or maybe into HR alittle bit?
No, no. No, no, no.
We, we could go into loyalty apps.
Some of our customers have got them all the loyalty apps so but
again, that's just exposing so you're.
Part of the text that rather than taking over like a major
part, you'll fit into the other guys.
Then you've got. I presume you integrate into
(20:27):
most. Yeah.
So we've got a couple of announcements coming up about
new integrations, but we can, wecan take him like information
from from anywhere. The important thing would be the
level of that information. So with inventory solutions, you
know, do they, can they expose ingredient level information to
give the best service? If, if not, we can, we can
(20:49):
we're, we're still sharing information from a dish level to
the to the guest at the at the table.
But if if that solution can't break it down by ingredients, we
can't give that information to the to the guest.
So, yeah. So it's, yeah, it's still key
where you sit in the middle of it, isn't it?
Because you need that. Well, to make it more as
effective as can be, you need that data, right?
(21:10):
Community system, yeah. But some, but because of that
some, some of our customers say actually we want it stand alone
because then we can you know, we're sharing and and then you
take out allergens from an inventory solution and just have
it in Ingrid defined. So it just depends on where the
master data sits. And, and how and how are you
perceived, I suppose like, you know, when you're going in, I
suppose if you're cold call someone or if you just meet
(21:32):
someone for the first time, is it we talked about a little bit
at the start is, is there a welcoming of old?
You were saying people are quitereceptive to the fact that they
know they need to address this problem.
But there, there's still a gap is there where you think that
people are not executing on it yet it's lower down the
priority. This is that.
Would that be fair to say? Yeah, I think, I think you know,
certainly at the moment with thethe April budget, there's a lot
(21:53):
of pressure. To hangover there, definitely.
Yes, there's a definite hangover.
And, you know, and if people arethinking about, you know, adding
new sites or selling sites or struggling financially or, you
know, the labour costs, I get it.
I can understand why that's a priority.
That's true. And then it's then then it's my
job to to convince them about the speed of the project and
say, look, actually, if you've got a load of things on your
(22:15):
plate, allergies, most people say that's the thing that keeps
them up at night. Yeah, so let me take that off
your plate with our allergy, youknow, registered allergists and
dietitians. And we do all the heavy lifting
like you say. What I wouldn't call it heavy
lifting, I'd call it light lifting because we make it easy
and we do 95%. And then all we're saying is,
you know, if you've you tell me there's Worcestershire sauce in
(22:38):
this, in this recipe, is that Liam Perrins or something else?
And then we get the ingredients from that, that product and, and
make it right in their, in theirdishes.
So, so really from the operator side, it's, it's a few questions
just for us to clarify ingredients and then we hand
over the tool and then it's so easy to use that is they can
(22:59):
manage and maintain. Well, I've been on it.
I've seen. Yeah, obviously we did the
webinar, we went through the product and I thought it was
really seamless. And in fact, one of the things I
loved about is that, like you said, the speed of getting to
what the issue is, rather than having to either fan through a
book or even actually on some ofthe original tech that came out
around allergens. This is bad because you're going
straight to the ingredient and you can actually see straight
away, or that's my, my particular issue is this one
(23:21):
ingredient and I can get straight to that and it knocks
out half the menu or it knocks out whatever dishes that I'm on.
So, and I think that's the real win.
Very quickly, what about transparency generally?
Do you think on a on a, with allergens, generally, are you
seeing a movement forward? I know that there's obviously
more people now in technology looking to address this problem,
and obviously there's been a statue come out around allergens
(23:42):
in the workplace, in the restaurant.
Sorry. And explain how we should deal
with them. Do you think there's enough
transparency still? We still got a bit of a way to
go in terms of people talking openly about allergens and how
we should deal with them. Yeah, I think pretty much, you
know, most of the industry are going back to the compliance
point. Most, most of the industry is
still set up around compliance. And because of that, you know,
(24:03):
it's, there's, there's a bit of a fear, you know, more
legislation will come. You know, there's, there's talk
about extending that to, to more, in more allergens.
We've already extended the 14 upto 21 allergens because we see
the net, you know, the most popular next ones through,
through the data that we see through usage.
But then the transparency is again going back to existing
(24:26):
tech stacks. It's limited to, to, to the tech
and the tech limits the transparency to the dish, not to
the ingredients. And that's what we kind of
unravel and expose to to the guest at the table because like
you say, you know, if I've got an allergy to egg white but not
egg yolk, I can search for that in.
(24:47):
A dish, it's convenience as well, right?
I think this comes back to convenience and the way we
behave around retail shopping, everything else.
Now, we want things quick and wewant to know quickly.
And I think obviously people allergens will behave
differently because they've beenmade to, because there's a risk
around what they're doing. But actually, I think that they
want speed of service. They still want to be treated
like everybody else in the restaurant.
They don't care. And if they can do it themselves
(25:07):
without disturbing the rest of their colleagues or friends
around dinner, I think they'd. And I'm unfortunately, I'm
talking behalf, Valerie, people are not one of them.
But I imagine that would be if it was me.
Definitely. I'd prefer that.
I'd prefer to be able to take the problem into my hands, sort
it out quite quickly without having to have a conversation
and have the awkward bit where everyone's looking at me going,
oh, yeah, I can have that, but Ican't have this.
And I don't want, you know, it'sjust awkward.
(25:29):
Yeah, they just and it's and youknow, the worst thing about it's
the start of the meal. So like for any restaurant or
listening, if you're starting every experience in your
restaurant like that with a withthat weird question going, you
know, you know, And then when the response is, yes, I have.
And the waiter looks like dread just appears in their face.
That's the start of someone's experience.
It's about to give you 4 hundred, £500 or whatever it
(25:51):
might be, depending on how many people are there.
But I just find that, yeah, I just, it's not easy.
Don't get me wrong, it's not easy for anybody, but I think if
you can address it, why wouldn'tyou?
Yeah, I just. Yeah, I find it.
It's baffling for me. But look what I suppose we
talked a little bit about transparency, but what do you
see in this space going forward?What do you think?
Especially if you agree to find.Are you guys developing more
ways to, I suppose help people? Yeah.
(26:12):
Well, I mean the the first levelis is kind of moving away from
compliance or not away from it, but over and above compliance,
so. Superseding it?
Almost, yes. Absolutely.
So, so the guest to demand we know is there.
So one of one of our best stats is that on average across all
our customer base, we we track repeat visits.
So if someone goes in and scans and agree to find QR code, we
(26:35):
know that device when it goes back, you know, in the coming
months and we see repeat visits on average are 26% month by
month, and that's against an industry average of about 6%.
It's really cool. So, and that's all about the
trust. So when someone goes in and they
think, wow, I can see every single ingredient in the in the
(26:55):
dishes I'm I'm choosing and those those people spend more
because I think actually, I'm not going to limit myself to and
they're. Going to bring more people with
them. Right.
And they bring their friends. So, so if, if one in three have
an allergy or an intolerance or,or the 40% with, with
preferences, if the average booking is, you know, three
people per table, you've basically got one person on each
(27:17):
in, in each booking who, who will be using and gridified or
will have a, a need. And then if those are the people
who are driving where the bookings go, that it drives a
lot of sales. So, so I think the more you
know, businesses that adopt thisingredient level of approach as
opposed to the allergen compliance approach, the the
(27:39):
more people will start to realize that actually compliance
is limiting sales. And actually what going over and
above and and addressing the guest experience will drive,
will drive sales and benefit therestaurant as opposed to being,
you know, a bit of a pain and it's hard to manage.
And it's, you know, government telling me what to do, which is
(28:00):
all negative. And, you know, which has been
the same, you know. It's actually a bit like food
safety in a way. I don't want to get too much
into this, but food safety has alevel of compliance, obviously,
and you have your ratings and whatnot.
But I worked for colleges and Hard Rock for about 15 years of
my career and they were both obsessed with but not food
standard. They didn't call it for.
They were accessible hygiene, full stop.
(28:20):
And they had a really high standard above and beyond what
you would have to do to get 3 or4 stars, 5 stars, whatever.
And it made us better like as a group, as an individual, as AGM,
whoever it was, it made us better because we just went
beyond what was ruled, you know,what was told, we were told to
do. And I think we should, if you
can achieve that in every level of your business, or, or at
least aim to achieve that in every level of business, you be,
(28:42):
you do become world class. You do become like a bit of a, a
bit of a, a winner in that, in that group, because no one can
compete with that. It's very hard to compete with
people who are obsessed with being top in everything.
And I, I do just think that whenpeople look at their choices
around technology they're using or the way they follow
compliance or whatever they might be doing, I think just
look at that. Just go above the bar a little
bit. Yeah.
(29:03):
Just help yourselves out becauselike you said, there's a,
there's a community here waitingto be looked after.
Yeah. They're going to bring their
mates, they're going to come back. 26% more or 20% more than
a regular customer. I yeah, all the indicators point
to yes. So for me it just makes.
Sense, yeah, and there's such. And I don't work from
gridifying, by the way, just to say this, but I just think this
particular problem we're quite passionate about.
But yeah. Yeah, and there's such a,
(29:24):
there's so many kind of gaps or opportunities.
So for example, you know, some some stats, there's 25% of
adults with kids with allergies refused to take to eat out
because they're too worried about their kids.
So they just don't go out. 40% won't visit. 40% of people with
an allergy don't visit a restaurant if they can't see the
(29:44):
menu in advance. So there's loads of all these
wins that if by, you know, having an ingredient filter on
the menu to say actually here's all the ingredients and you
know, you can pick out what you want to eat beforehand, you're
going to encourage people to. Go as an apparent example of if
one of my three had that yeah, 100% we would be I mean Uber
cautious. I mean that my youngest is
(30:05):
autistic so and we're already cautious about him right Just
what environment we put him in so do we want to put him in a we
don't want to offend at the diner.
We don't want to upset at the diners, you know if he has a
little tantrum or whatever. So we can we try and keep we
we're already conscious about where we die.
I can't even imagine what it's like if you've got something
that would affect you personallyor your child.
So yeah, obviously drives decision making.
So look, I mean, yeah, I think it's very, very interesting Don
(30:28):
we've got obviously I've got thewebinar, which we'll share with
this podcast episode as well. How do people get hold of you if
they're interested in finding out more about angry define?
So the best way would be my emails.
D child at angrydefine.com or find me on LinkedIn.
We will also be We've got some quite big things coming up.
Do you want to talk about them? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Far away. Sorry you're off in your.
(30:49):
Prime No, that's right. We get it.
We. I can't do too much, but we've
got you. Can't do that.
You can't offer it up and then pull it back.
Carry on. We've got a few integrations
coming up which we're really excited about what we're, we're
building towards a model of almost like touchless allergen
management. So from the supply chain of
ingredient information coming almost automated via via AI and
(31:14):
linking with suppliers. We've got through 28 minutes for
that AI, but there you go. Yeah, it is.
It's true. There's AI to a point.
No, no, no. It's going to be part of our
makeup, right? So.
Yeah. And and then we're, we're, if
you anyone what I would say anyone using an allergy matrix
in restaurants, follow us on LinkedIn because there's, I
(31:34):
can't say too much, but there's going to be an announcement of
what we, what we will do to makethose operators lives an awful
lot easier. When's that going to be?
We we hope in about 3 to 4 weeks.
OK, I'm going to say I'm going to say July about right.
Yeah, well, yeah, about right. OK, we'll just the summer.
Summer holidays. It is tackle iterations will
(31:57):
happen, I'm sure. OK, that's that's really
exciting. OK, well, I'll make sure that we
put that in the copy as well to tell people to keep their eye
out. But brilliant, Dom nice to chat
to you again. Appreciate what you guys are
doing. And I think it's I think you're
leading, leading a bit of a battle out there.
And I think it's I think it's one that needs to be won.
So good luck to that. And anybody who's listening
wants to get in touch. You can find Dom on the
marketplace as well. And great to find.
(32:18):
And yeah, and we shall see you all next week.
Say bye Dom. Bye bye.
Thank you.
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