Whiting & Hammond gets real-time visibility with Zonal technology

Whiting and Hammond have been customers of Zonal since June 2010 and took the decision to implement Zonal’s end-to-end solution across all sites to improve management control as the business expanded from four to seven sites.

Similar to most R200 member companies, the challenge when expanding a business from one outlet to multiple sites is retaining a consistent level of control over costs, margins and standards, in addition to analysing sales and cost trends.

The company, based in Kent, was founded in 2003, and has now grown to seven sites including a unique joint venture with K College where a group of students run ‘The View’ Restaurant at the Tonbridge campus.

Zonal’s Aztec Enterprise and site EPoS software in all sites has enabled Brian Whiting, the company’s founder, to retain complete control and maintain real-time visibility of the key performance indicators.

It is the simplicity and rich functionality of Aztec that delivers real benefits to the Whiting and Hammond business. At head office, the latest sales data is updated every 30 minutes, and the management team make full use of the promotions module creating bespoke offers quickly and easily that are sent automatically to each outlet.

“Since installing Zonal’s EPoS solution, the food and drink GPs have increased by 1.5 % across the business” says Brian. “Zonal’s state-of-the-art hardware and Aztec software has definitely helped us to become more efficient and streamline our operation.”

The key to ensuring that the benefits have been delivered is the partnership between Whiting and Hammond and the Zonal team. As the business has evolved, the way Brian and his team utilise Aztec has been customised to ensure that the benefits of the solution continue to be realised.

The Whiting and Hammond team manage all of their own data at head office and Zonal provided interfaces to their finance package, labour scheduling and forecasting software. In addition, the suggested order functionality is being trialled in one site prior to a full roll out across the estate managing stock levels and improving compliance using authorised suppliers. Custom-designed reports that provide simple headline sales and cover numbers to keep Brian and his team in close control over the hourly performance of the business.

Following the success of the group’s loyalty card, developed by Zonal, Whiting and Hammond launched the new Christmas gift card in 2014, which allows visitors to share their love of the company with friends and family. Customers can gift a monetary value to loved ones not just for Christmas but for any occasion throughout the year in a stylish gift card wallet.

Investing in the right technology to manage a growing business is a key decision for any entrepreneur. In selecting Zonal as Whiting and Hammonds EPoS partner, the expanding business has access to the resource and experience that Zonal has gained over 35 years in the hospitality industry, providing robust technology that handles over 4 million meals per week through systems installed in over 8000 outlets throughout the UK.