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What We Learned At A Big Tech Conference In San Francisco

Last week Salesforce.com, the leading web-based CRM (customer relationship management) system, which has paved the way with innovative tools to connect customers to sales and service teams, had a 90,000-person convention in San Francisco. Headliners included Sir Richard Branson (pic below), the Red Hot Chili Peppers, the CEO of Burberry and Yelp, plus Tony Robbins who did an amazing job of getting a crowd of 10,000 app developers, CEO’s and marketing geeks to hug and dance with each other in one room in under three hours! Needless to say it was an event to remember! Being in the web-based technology space, we figured a trip out to San Francisco wouldn’t hurt (especially on the eating side) and we actually gleaned some good ideas from the event that we’ll pose as questions here on this blog…

• What if you could connect all of your systems (financial, operational, marketing) in one place and manage from a central dashboards? POS developers are constantly writing integrations to my.whentomanage.com, and now we’ve got connections to QuickBooks and coming really soon: integration to suppliers. We see the future as being very bright for operators looking to drive improvements within their orgs!
• Is it important for great companies, like Salesforce.com, to be socially minded? You bet! Ever heard of CommunityPlates? WhenToManage is a partner with this organization which helps eliminate food waste. But a larger cause is always something people can rally behind.
• Is it important that a user of the software be part of the conversation on what gets launched? Salesforce.com has three major releases each year: spring, summer and winter. At WhenToManage we release more frequently than that. However, we’d like to hear what you want. Post something on our Twitter feed at https://twitter.com/whentomanage or contact us at Sales@WhenToManage.com

Sir Richard Branson talking with Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce.com

I just loved the phrase "the cloud is democratic..." Is this the image of a connected world?

And I couldn't help but post something from Tony Robbins... The man is amazing!

Regulate >>> Delegate >>> Collaborate

In speaking with our customers about the services we provide, one thing strikes me above all else… And that is this one phrase: there’s just something about collaborating online. In our experience, and I’d point to our interview with a Buffalo Wild Wings franchisee, what has been so remarkable is how the web levels the playing field. It opens up information and ideas to the point where improvements/opportunities/challenges/communication occurs more rapidly. Our customers tell us that being able to log in to the reporting Dashboard to review operational data, creates flexibility on how information comes to them (knowledge is available). How they use it, how they consume it, share it and when is now up to them…

But beyond our application and services, do you agree with the premise of this post? That collaborating online fosters a greater sense of creativity, of sharing, of power to the group?

Clay Shirky, the author of Here Comes Everybody, posits that if you build cooperation into the infrastructure, you make groups flat and more coordinated… Think so? Check out the video below from a 2008 TED TALK, in which Shirky makes a case about institutions vs collaborations.

Running Teams Of People The Apple Way

Ever wonder how Apple creates so many amazing products? Think: teams! Steve Jobs, in this short interview, speaks to his philosophy on managing people. With the recent news about Samsung vs. Apple, we thought this was a fitting post… Question… How would Apple’s approach help or hurt your organization?

Top Restaurant Blog Posts For The Week

What better way to end the week, than to prepare you for the weekend? And so we are sifting through some of our book-marked blogs with the hope that you’ll find some of these writers/posts as interesting as we did. Enjoy…

• Shocking Secrets Of Social – Did you know that almost 70% of consumers have never followed a brand on Facebook? Some interesting stats here…
• Wall Street Journal Article On Rising Food Costs – Did you know that Buffalo Wild Wings said raw chicken prices have risen almost 70%? I’m sure everyone is tired of this drought, but it is having real impacts!
• Market Hard To The Tourist On The Open Road – Spending by driving tourists is up, almost by double-digits!!!
• It Isn’t All Bad – Same store sales are up, and rising faster each month…

Happy reading, and good luck in sales this weekend!

Corn Production Estimates Down By 13%, And How This Impacts Your Restaurant

Frankly, the reality is simple: food prices are on the rise. Most importantly, corn prices are rising. So how does this impact your business? Again, simple: each item you sell, might need a small price adjustment! Here’s the skinny from the USDA, as reported on USA TODAY:

The government report said corn prices, which already have reached record levels above $8 per bushel in the last month, could go as high as $8.90 per bushel, well above $6.40 per bushel projected in July and $4.80 per bushel projected in April at planting time.

On the Chicago Board of Trade, corn futures sold for $8.43 a bushel shortly after the report was issued, as traders already had factored lower production into their numbers.

About 40% of the U.S. corn crop is used to make ethanol, under federal mandate. Another 40% is used as animal feed, both here and abroad. The remaining 20% is eaten in mostly processed foods in the United Statessuch as high-fructose corn syrup and items like corn flakes. The USDA has warned that the 2.5% to 3% increase in food prices this year will widen to as much as 5% next year.

Is this dire? You’re going to have to be the judge of that one… But what you do about it all depends on how well you plan and execute a strategy to secure your inventory. What to consider:

• Reporting: menu pricing is going to be key! Mostly, you’ll want to track your costs and profits per item. Use your product mix to analyze what is selling, and an inventory management system to uncover the highest profits per item.
• Invoice Management: know what you’re buying and the price increase. We had a customer, during a demo, say, “I’d rather my staff know exactly how much my costs are rising by looking at each and every invoice.”
• Physical Counts: pretty much a critical component of any inventory system is how well you account for product on-hand. Weekly counts will provide you a good estimate of what to buy, and if you should buy in the first place!

One of the big improvements can be institutional. Get your staff to start reading and learning more about proper inventory management (can I recommend a blog). Have them consider what it would mean if you raised your menu prices? Would customers like it? Probably not, so have them help you with creative marketing ways around the issues. My point, keep your staff aware of the challenges and circumstances surrounding your P&L.