A CASE STUDY FOR

Lucky Onion Group

The Challenge

The Lucky Onion Group have a varied estate of hotel and F&B-led sites and were undergoing a period of aggressive expansion including the launch of a new hotel concept using tech-led solutions to connect urban clients with local culture.

With eight independently branded hotels, pubs and restaurants (and growing), the group needed to simplify their procedures to create efficiencies and cost-savings behind the scenes while delivering exemplary customer service front-of-house.

They needed an EPoS solution that could handle the varying needs of the estate, including integrated payments and automation for their 100% cashless Cult hotels property and integrations with their existing third-party software – ResDiary, Guestline, Sage and Procure Wizard.

“Our old provider was sufficient for what we had previously, but when we tried to bring in third-party integrations to help simplify our processes, our existing EPoS actually made it more complex as we couldn’t get it to integrate efficiently. Additionally, pricing and service levels were not as we would have liked.” Phil Brown, Head of Operations, The Lucky Onion Group & Cult Hotels

“The pointOne product is flexible enough to ebb and flow with our business needs. The head office dashboard is much simpler and more intuitive than the software we have used before. The way it has been built and configured means, it’s easy to use and interpret. It’s probably one of the simplest and easiest EPoS systems that I’ve ever worked with.”

Phil Brown / Head of Operations

The Solution

Speaking with some of our clients working across similar spaces in hotels, casual and fine-dining confirmed to Phil that our EPoS is proven at juggling this mixture of hotel and F&B-led requirements.

Simple EPoS

“It’s probably one of the simplest and easiest EPoS systems that I’ve ever worked with, and I’ve worked with a few!” All sites are run as independent brands, and so having a uniform, and aligned back-of-house EPoS that staff can log in and use straight away saves time and helps them maintain the high-quality customer service their guests expect. Phil is pleased that “no re-training is required, and all the associated integrations we use work exactly the same so staff can just hit the ground running.”

Flexible

“The pointOne product is flexible enough to ebb and flow with our business needs” explains Phil. “For example, unlike our previous supplier, whose database was restrictive, pointOne allows us to add an unlimited amount of F&B lines, amend and adjust accordingly as our menus, offers and sites grow.”

Reporting

Using pointOne’s cloud-based reporting means Phil and his team can now see sales in real-time and respond quickly if staffing levels need adjusting. “The head office dashboard is much simpler and more intuitive than the software we have used before. The way it has been built and configured means, it’s easy to use and interpret, and so we rarely need to call pointOne for support.”

The Results

Cost-savings

By transferring to a more efficient open platform EPoS that can integrate with all The Lucky Onion’s required third-party software, they have made significant CAPEX and OPEX savings.

One of their newest Cult Hotels properties, The George opened as a 100% cashless site. pointOne was able to introduce one of our payment partners, Payment Sense to ensure this process was seamless with the use of integrated PDQs for quick and error-free transactions. “Cashing up is now a 30-second process for our staff which before could take hours across all the sites, and we have no mitigating losses from banking or input errors.”

Time-saving

The Lucky Onion team have managed the rollout of four new sites in less than a year, and so having an EPoS system that is easy to use with minimal training has helped this process enormously. Post pandemic lockdown, some of the brands utilised the pointOne Online Ordering software to run a takeaway service and, because this is a simple extension of the EPoS platform, staff were able to take and process orders straightaway.

“pointOne has provided us with great service levels from the start. For example, Online Ordering was added to our system quickly and with no issues. If we have any problems, the service guys are quick to jump on it and sort it out. The customer service we get is faultless”.

Phil Brown / Head of Operations