Toast Hopes to Tempt Restaurants With Catering and Events Platform

Toast is looking to move beyond its roots as a restaurant point-of-sale (POS) provider.

The company debuted Toast Catering & Events, a new tool integrated with its POS to help restaurants manage catering orders and plan events, according to a Wednesday (Aug. 2) press release.

“As restaurants look to diversify revenue streams, catering and events are top of mind as attractive growth areas,” Toast Co-founder and Chief Operating Officer Aman Narang said in the release. “However, an additional service model can mean taking on managing multiple systems that often operate in silos.”

The new tool, he added, brings the complete catering and event order management cycle into one platform, letting restaurants save time and transform their businesses.

It also lets restaurants manage guests’ dietary restrictions, designate whether orders are pickup or delivery, and flag special pricing, per the release. Features also include digital invoice creation, payment processing, preparing and packing, and repeat catering orders.

Tools like these could be useful as technology has become table stakes for the restaurant industry, where well-placed applications are transforming the way eateries can entice and retain diners.

“Hospitality truly transcends the four walls of a restaurant,” Chandler Stroud, a vice president at Resy, told PYMNTS in an interview posted Tuesday (Aug. 1). “And restaurants have become incredibly focused on how they can use the guest information they’re securing from the various technologies they’re using to uplevel the hospitality they’re offering.”

Restaurants have begun intentionally integrating technology throughout the customer journey, from pre-service to interactions after the meal is done.

However, there may be such a thing as too much technology in the restaurant experience. The PYMNTS study “Connected Dining: The Robot Will Take Your Order Now” found that two-thirds of consumers are not interested in robotics-powered food preparation and production.

Among those diners, most said they are worried about the effect automation will have on their meals. Eighty-three percent said they think meals prepared by automated systems or robots would be lower quality and less personalized than food made by human cooks.

The concerns echo consumers’ existing worries that restaurants are becoming too impersonal, as shown in PYMNTS’ study last year “The Digital Divide: Technology, the Metaverse and the Future of Dining Out.”

The post Toast Hopes to Tempt Restaurants With Catering and Events Platform first appeared on PYMNTS.com.