More Fun and Less Friction with Tim McLaughlin, Cofounder and CEO of GoTab

Waiting to be served drinks and food and settling the tab rank most certainly as the pain points of the dining experience. As the famous song goes, "You got to accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative." In that spirit, to relieve the friction and induce more seamless service, Tim McLaughlin combined his skills as a technologist with his experience as a brewery restaurant owner to cofound GoTab, a restaurant commerce platform. GoTab increases the volume of hospitality and profitability – a tune we can all groove to!

Read the interview with Tim McLaughlin, "Using Technology to Foster Hospitality" in Boston Hospitality Review.

The “Distinguished” podcast is produced by Boston University School of Hospitality Administration. 

Host: Arun Upneja, Dean
Producer: Mara Littman, Executive Director of Strategic Operations and Corporate Relations
Research and Content Creation: Lan Lu
Marketing: Anne Dawson
Editing: Isabella Laikin and James Leon

Music: “Airport Lounge" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0

Transcript

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Welcome & Guest Introduction: Tim McLaughlin and GoTab

SPEAKER_02 0:05

Welcome to the Distinguished Podcast produced by Boston University School of Hospitality Administration. I'm Arun Rupnja, Dean of the School, and today I am pleased to welcome our guest, Tim McLaughlin. Tim is the co-founder and CEO of GoTab Incorporated, a leading restaurant commerce platform that helps more than 1,000 large and mid-sized restaurants, breweries, bars, hotels, and other venues. In 2022, Insider named Tim to its annual restaurant Innovators Powers Players List, and Incorporated recognized GoTab as a power partner for the company's proven track record supporting entrepreneurs and startups. Welcome Ting to the Distinguished Podcast. Thank you for having me, Aaron. In your career, you started out as a technologist. Then in 2013, you co-founded Caboose Brewing Company, an upscale brewery and farm-to-table concept in Fairfax, Virginia. You also own Ferment Nation, a craft beer and cider distributorship. So what led you to make this shift from hospitality to this career?

From Software to Beer: Why Tim Made the Leap Into Hospitality

SPEAKER_01 1:16

Well, it's funny, probably not a lot of people go from sort of conference rooms and whiteboards, which is what my prior life was comprised of, uh, to the sort of messy world, if you will, of patrons and guests in restaurants. Um but the reality is I'm I'm a physical person. I like physical things, I like physical spaces. I'm actually a mechanical engineer, despite having been in software for my whole life. Um and I wanted to do things with my hands, like make beer and meet people and make people smile. So that was that to me is a lot more fun than sitting in uh you know another conference room discussing where to move a pixel on a screen. Not to say I don't do that, but um it's fun to see the physical manifestations. Fantastic.

The Pain Point That Inspired GoTab: Lines and Paying Are Not Fun

SPEAKER_02 2:03

We are all school of hospitality, so we love that. Um let's talk about GoTab. Uh you founded in 2016. In the early days, GoTab consisted of code on the receipt for mobile payments, which was at that time pretty novel. Um, but innovation and invention are usually inspired by the need to solve or address a problem. And so you've been owner of a restaurant and brewery. What was the problem or pain point that led you to found GoTab?

SPEAKER_01 2:32

Um the high points are the experience of greeting, uh, meeting great people, hanging out with your friends, enjoying great food and beverage, or great spaces, maybe seeing a show. Um, lots of things that are amazing. There's a lot of not fun things too. Uh like standing in lines can be really not fun when you don't want to do it. Maybe the first time it's kind of fun, the anticipation can be exciting, but the second time gets pretty old, and the third time is something nobody really likes to do. Um, another one's paying. Paying is in I don't know anybody who has ever highlighted the payment uh aspect of an experience as the highlight of it. Um initially with GoTab, our goal was to solve the what we viewed as the unfund part, uh, which is paying. And particularly this was a need because my first brewery, this was a time when breweries were relatively scarce in Virginia, um, it was packed. We actually had lines out the door, couldn't seat people. I had the really agonizing experience of getting my first Yelp review that was a one-star review because they couldn't get a table. Anyone in hospitality's experience that you could get the joys of loving Yelp. Someone who doesn't come in and gives you a one-star review. So our thought was okay, if we can get people out of tables faster, and we're not doing it by pushing them out, we're doing it by making something they don't want to be doing, is waiting for a check to go faster. We thought we'd get there. Um I don't know if I'm allowed to jump forward, but the reality is it actually wasn't compelling at all. It was too much of a technical shift, it was too much of a mind shift and pattern. Um, and we really had like 3%, optimistically 5% uptake. It really wasn't a compelling solution.

Early Challenges: The Initial QR Payment Concept Flopped

SPEAKER_02 4:14

Aaron Powell As you were expanding GoTab beyond your own restaurant, what were some of the initial challenges in the early adopter phase?

Product-Market Fit: When QR Ordering at the Brewery Changed Everything

SPEAKER_01 4:23

Well, I think I just told you the first portion of putting a code and later a QR code, like the first one was digits. Um, then later we moved to QRs as QRs for support on iPhones. Um it really didn't get there. Um So I'd say the first time we had a product market fit was when I opened my second brewery in 2018. We opened it with QRs, not just for paying, but QRs for ordering. Okay. Um which was all of a sudden we went from do we have a business here or not in GoTab to, oh my God, we actually have a business because we saw on Fridays and Saturday nights when there were lines, and mind you, this is way early. This is QRs were barely nascent in most people's understanding of technology. Um when there were lines, 60% of our beer ordering volume would go through the QRs. So this is now five years ago, two years prior to COVID. Many people didn't know how to scan a QR in this country. Um the big challenge, though, from that was okay, we proved this success in my own brewery, and we proved it in a highly educated, young uh crowd that is Fairfax, Virginia, uh very diverse, so just very early adopters, if you will. Um we quickly found out that nobody else wanted any of this.

unknown 5:45

Okay.

The Industry Said No: Knocking on Doors Before COVID

SPEAKER_01 5:46

The hospitality industry basically said this QR thing, this is not hospitality. Um and my contention has always been hospitality, it's great to talk to a person when the person's available. It's not great to have to sit there and wait if someone isn't available. Um that's really the the itch we're trying to solve. But you know, in hospitality, I think we've always hoped or imagined or dreamed we'd have the resource to be everywhere at the same time.

SPEAKER_02 6:12

Aaron Powell So I guess you were a little bit ahead of time there, but was that the time when you were actually trying to actively trying to sell it to other restaurants?

COVID as a Catalyst: Three to Five Years of Tech Adoption Accelerated

SPEAKER_02 6:20

And they said no.

SPEAKER_01 6:20

Aaron Ross Powell We we absolutely were. We knocked on lots and lots and lots of doors. Uh in fact, in 2019, we knocked on a whole bunch of doors that said, you're crazy, this is not hospitality. Um fortunately for us, unfortunately for the world, uh when COVID hit, all the places that told us to pounce and in 2019 called us back. Um so that was kind of the lucky or unlucky break. I mean, many businesses were made or destroyed, unfortunately, by COVID. But in our case, uh it we view it as it accelerated technical adoption by probably three to five years. Um so a lot of things that were I mean, actually another one that was huge is video conferencing.

SPEAKER_02 7:01

Right.

SPEAKER_01 7:01

Yeah. We did a lot of video conferences for our demos, but we couldn't get our clients to do video conferences. So similarly, that that has become ubiquitous. And similarly, uh QR codes, loved or hated, they've they've become ubiquitous as well.

QR Codes Beyond Ordering and Paying: Positioning, Tab Sharing, and More

SPEAKER_02 7:15

So then here are the two use cases. One is ordering, and the other one is to pay the check.

SPEAKER_01 7:23

There's actually many Q cases for QRs. Okay. Um QR code's just you know a bunch of data. Um we use them for positioning. So anytime you have a QR code on a table or in a hotel room, maybe on a bench, it it tells us where it's positioned because it's a unique QR code. As you wander around a restaurant, we in the hospitality industry know every table has a number. Um, we know where to deliver their food or their beverage. Um that's another case. Another case we use QR codes is for passing off or sharing tabs. So if I open a tab for you and I, uh, and maybe we're getting, maybe I'm paying for something for you, um, I can securely show you my QR code. I could also text it to you, and that lets you join my tab, meaning I'm paying in maybe a low service environment where there isn't someone coming out and saying, oh, is your check together or not? This is a way for me to securely pass information to your device uh that's that's you know, again,

The ROI Question: How GoTab Justifies the Cost for Operators

SPEAKER_01 8:19

ubiquitous.

SPEAKER_02 8:19

Aaron Powell The question is, I mean, uh initially there is an investment to put GoTab into the restaurant or the bar or whatever establishment you have. Um so how do you justify the cost? What are what are some of the advantages of putting this in? Does it decrease cost, does it increase

From QR-Only to Full-Service POS: How GoTab Evolved Post-COVID

SPEAKER_02 8:37

revenue?

SPEAKER_01 8:37

Aaron Powell I should be clear. We've evolved a lot since then. GoTab can act like a fully conventional POS, no QR codes at all. Um so where GoTab has moved since COVID, this was all everything I spoke about was really prior to COVID. Uh in COVID, we rolled out our own full, fully functioning mobile POS, so handheld POS, countertop POS. Uh and one of the things that we built even before COVID also was the kitchen operations. Um of the things that most people don't realize, and and candidly why QR codes have been so hated is because they tend to break the kitchen. And what I mean by that is when you deploy, like the scenario you just described, where you when you deploy a bunch of QR codes, that means every guest in your restaurant or hotel now has a POS. So there's no throttling, if you will. There's no limiting of orders. Um and if you have 100 people in a space, and maybe in a normal restaurant you might have two or three POS terminals, you can only take three orders at a time, two orders at a time. If you have 100 people, you actually have 100 phones, which means you have potentially 100 orders all simultaneously coming to your bar into your kitchen. Um and I unfortunately we lived through this. We ran the US Open for golf once, and they they didn't build a large enough bar. They had two bars, and then unfortunately, it was on the West Coast. Uh so the bars opened at 10 a.m. and there were 15,000 people there. They had two bars. Oh. As you might imagine, everybody wanted a beer at 10 a.m. Pacific time, because many of them are on the East Coast time. Um and so, you know, 10,000 beer orders came in roughly at 10 a.m. Oh my goodness to come out of two bars. So obviously there were a lot of angry people. Um one good thing about GoTab is we enable a lot of ordering. One bad thing is we can totally annihilate your ability to deliver on those orders. So um, the next problem that we ended up having to solve was okay, how do you manage that flow? How do you set expectations so that you don't take too many orders? So we ended up building all of these different things. So kitchen operations, KDS, POS. And then as COVID passed, thankfully, um, you know, people have gone back to full service restaurants where they can and want that. Um so GoTab now is a full, you know, fixed POS, handheld POS. You don't have to use a QR anywhere. And we do, we have fine dining restaurants using GoTab, and they don't want a QR at any point on their table. Um there are other features that we have that are actually very cool, even in a fine dining restaurant, um, like texting the guests their tab when they are seated so that they can walk out or view their tab at any point, or God forbid there isn't a server nearby and they want a glass of wine, they can get that. Um there's not a QR involved, but there's all kinds of other uh capabilities. So I I digressed, but the the point is that we've moved into a lot of other use cases where the same sort of principles of high-efficiency kitchen operations, knowing where the guest is and knowing where to take it to them, uh are all pervasive into

Why Europe Settled Checks at the Table Before the U.S.

SPEAKER_01 11:50

our system.

SPEAKER_02 11:50

Aaron Powell So another thing I want to mention, and we were talking about this before the podcast started. Um I was in Austria recently, and and I you've been traveling a lot. Um, and anytime we go to Europe, I want to settle a check. The server comes to my desk, to my table, and presents me the tab, and I show the credit card and it's cleared right there on the spot. Uh besides saving time, it also gives me a lot of comfort that there is no fraud happening. Right. So I've not seen that in the U.S. Why is that?

Why U.S. Restaurants Are Stuck on Legacy POS Systems

SPEAKER_01 12:20

Um I mean you are seeing it with handhelds. Uh some of the big POSs have handhelds. Uh the reason is because people are sitting on a lot of old systems. They purchased 20, 30 years ago. Uh they don't realize the efficiency gains that they could get from a newer system. Um, and so they they are remaining on those where they print the ticket, they bring it out for signature, and they take your credit card back. Um it's sort of this the economic sunk cost fallacy. Like they believe that it's going to cost them a lot. Um you asked earlier about the ROI, and I I unfortunately skipped that question. I didn't mean to. The reality is like our system runs on commodity cell phones. So you you actually have no CapEx or no upfront costs. Um I know other systems are trying to get there as well. So we're I definitely won't claim to be the only one that does that. But for running a full-service kitchen with full KDS and multi-station KDS, you can't do that right now. A lot of those systems are proprietary and you're looking at a big upfront hardware cost. And I think that's why people are stuck with these 20-year-old systems or even 10-year-old systems that are really not as flexible. Um the newer systems like ours is all software. You can run it on an Android device, you can run it on an iOS device, you can install the POS on your own personal phone. You can just go download it from the App Store and start it up. And that didn't cost us anything, and it didn't cost you anything. Um I'd say as that becomes more prev prevalent, uh, and some of the new credit card reading technology, which is you can actually take a credit card now and touch it to a phone, and that is now a credit card reader, so you don't have to buy these stupid two, three hundred, four hundred dollar credit card readers. Um, and you're gonna see a lot more of this stuff become prevalent. Um I'd say, in a sense, like Europe leapfrogged the United States in its adoption of mobile POS, although it's now inferior because now the US is gonna leapfrog Europe and move to, I would say, commodity cell phones as a mobile POS, which is what we're doing.

Credit Card Security Standards: The U.S. vs. Europe Gap

SPEAKER_02 14:19

So earlier you mentioned that um when you take the um when when a server approaches you and you takes the credit card out of your vision, that's not allowed by credit card companies. And I guess that's the reason why in Europe they try to settle it right on the spot. Um so that's very strange that in the US we are used to our credit cards being taken out of our sight.

SPEAKER_01 14:43

Yeah. I agree. It's very strange. It shouldn't really be the case. Um there are emerging standards for sort of higher, I don't want to say security, lowering fraud in Europe that are making their way to the U.S. Um, but even things like the CVV code, which you now have to enter all the time on e-commerce, or uh some of the what they call two-factor uh verification, where if you ever do a big online purchase and it makes you enter in a code that was texted to you. Um it's funny, that standard is actually not even high enough for Europe, Europe to use. So that standard that we're using, which is called 3DS, uh, is actually not acceptable in Europe because even though it's better than what we have here, it's still not good enough for their for their requirements. Um I would say in in general, yes, there's a lot of um sort of legacy in the US. Um I think I think once people get past the sunk cost fallacy and realize that there's a lot of gains in the the biggest shift is really just shifting your operation. It's not a capital expense. It's really just realizing, okay, I'm gonna have to teach my people to work a little differently. And if I do that, I can recognize, you know, really big guest experience improvements first and foremost, but then also a ton of efficiency gains. We just for example, uh you asked earlier about the ROI. Our average, and this is average, our average restaurant is 25.8 percent labor cost. That's average. That's like that's not a bad number for a labor cost in a restaurant. In fact, I know plenty that are north of 30. Um and then our sales per labor hour is 83 bucks. And again, these are just the average numbers. The ROI we see is like three to six months on the product rolling out, assuming you've implemented some of the better practices and you aren't treating it like a cash register. And that's really what we find is if you take advantage of what the technology can do for you, you can get you know s really substantial gains and efficiency and a and a guest experience. Um if you treat it like a cash register, then yes, it's it's really going to be no better than a cash

Table Turnover and the Time Saved by Paying at the Table

SPEAKER_01 16:56

register.

unknown 16:56

Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_02 16:56

Right. And you know, just to sort of highlight one aspect of it, when you know when when a customer takes the tab and and you have to take it now, first you have to go inside, print it, bring it, then you go to take it down back inside. All of those tips are saved because you know, someone says, okay, I won my tab, you're right there. Show them the tab and they pay on the spot. I mean, that just saves so much time. And going back to your earlier point of having a more rapid turnover, table turnover, that's just so critical.

The Check Presenter POS: Letting Guests Split Their Own Bills

SPEAKER_01 17:25

Aaron Ross Powell Well, so there's a feature we have on our handheld POS. Um, so it's specifically designed for splitting. If you've ever had the joy of being a server, uh you get to enjoy splitting guest checks. And all you can do is split a check wrong. Right. Um so we actually have the ability with our uh mobile POS, we can drop it on the table. It looks a lot like a check presenter intentionally. So it's like a leather folio. Um and the idea is that the guest can do their own splitting at the table on that device. So they can pick which items they want to pay for, they hit pay, they tap their credit card, they pass it to their friend who does the same and they can split evenly, they can split by item. And if you've, again, if you've ever done splitting at brunch, it's a nightmare from uh from a server's perspective. It may take you 20 minutes, and that's not time that's you're getting paid for. Um so in the ideal world, you drop off the it's basically the POS converts into a check presenter. You drop that on the table, they do their own splitting, you walk away, screen turns green when it's done, you pick it back up, it's a mobile POS. Of course, if you need to have two, you can because they're they're low cost. Um but it's a thankless job payment is. It's just a transactional job and a choose up time. Um we should absolutely come say goodbye. You should absolutely come spend the time as a server, uh, but we just don't think like picking which item goes on which bill is really a great use of anyone's time.

The Bar Problem: Closing Tabs to Move to a Table Creates Friction

SPEAKER_02 18:52

Um, what is also very interesting in a bar situation is that um you know you have to, if you move, you have to settle your bill and then move to another place. And that just creates a lot of friction in the service and the hospitality. So Correct.

How GoTab Attributes Tips to the Right Staff Member

SPEAKER_01 19:07

And another one actually you just mentioned, which I find uh and uh maybe I'll save it for a tipping discussion. Uh so I say I order a drink at the bar and then I have to close out my check to go to the table, and we all know the reason for those so the bartender gets their tip. Right. Um in our system, tips are attributed to whoever took the order.

unknown 19:26

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 19:27

So what that means is that the tip for the bartender will be apportioned out of the total tab, even as the guest wanders around. If they order something at the bar, then that portion of the tip goes to the bartender. If they go to a table, that portion of the tip goes to whoever came to their table and took the order. And then anything that they order on their own, we leave in a pool up to the restaurant to decide how they allocate that. So there is no need to this whole silly model of closing out the tab, because we know every single order and who took it. And if you want to assign the tips for that order to that, you know, and I hate to use this word in hospitality, but in other industries we call them salespeople, right? Right. Um so if someone comes out and takes your order in a s in effect, they kind of are a salesperson and they're doing their job by coming and approaching you and finding it what it is you would like. Um and then, of course, we attribute that tip to them, which is a very fair model. It certainly drives the right behavior as well, which is hey, go see how the guests are doing and see if they need anything. And of course, they get the tip for that effort.

Has the Tipping Culture Gone Too Far?

SPEAKER_02 20:30

That is that is just fantastic. So since we are on tips, so let's talk about um you know a big complaint that is um there that you know people are being nudged for tips. So every single place you go, uh the screen is done. You mentioned that at the beginning, you turn the screen and you say, um and you're asking for a tip. And this the tip system has you know has expanded beyond used to be traditionally restaurants and bars, and now convenience stores and picking up even takeout orders. So it's um has this trend gone too far?

SPEAKER_01 21:03

Uh I mean, I I think so. Uh but that might be because I'm I'm not, you know, I I guess the people who are what we see is tips are correlated with age, inversely correlated with age. And so that puts me on the old side, right? Because I don't I'm not totally keen on it. Um the I mean I heard there's now taking tips at grocery stores. It certainly is the case. I I personally think it's it's gone way too far. Um I think long term we'll probably move the I hope that we move the direction of, say, you know, some of the European countries where it's just it's not expected, which is interesting because the UK is actually going towards tips right now, so go figure on that. The other thing is it you do find that people are a little more predictable and much more interested in showing up in their jobs uh more consistently with a higher minimum wage and a less tip driven sort of variable aspect. It's a less feast and famine um, if you will. Um I don't know. I'm obviously an advocate of probably eliminating the tip portion of the minimum wage in the U.S. and moving more in the direction of a stabilized

How GoTab Handles Tip Pooling and Distribution

SPEAKER_01 22:10

income. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_02 22:10

No, it's very interesting. I really appreciate this perspective that there is a difference in how people behave, whether they are receiving fistful of cash, like you said, or the money is going into their check and is going into their bank account as part of their regular budget. So going back to that question, so it does everyone in the restaurant front and back share equally, or do you have differential Not equally. Not equally.

SPEAKER_01 22:34

Yeah, it's not equally. So you know, half days, depending on uh how they allocate them. And then they'll tip backs to the bar or whatever the bar staff, and then likewise tip backs to the kitchen staff. Um there's a lot of different ways you can do it. And with GoTab, we work with a bunch of different tip management systems. Um it's really up to the operators to what they think is fair and equitable um for the team. You can also do uh what I said, which was attribute some portion of the tip to the server who uh handled those guests. Right. So if you wanted to like give an over-allocation to them, if it's their table, um, you could certainly do that, but it's depends on what you think is the right model. Um you could also just I would probably err on the other side, which is just keep it even, but then look at the metrics of sales by server. Not necessarily tabs by server, because that actually if if you're doing a shared model, it tabs doesn't indicate anything. Tabs just means they owned, in the old sense, they own that table. But if you go to France, for example, you're gonna have three different servers approach your table at different times. They don't assign a server

How Shared Tipping Models Naturally Push Out Non-Performers

SPEAKER_01 23:48

to a table.

SPEAKER_02 23:48

Aaron Ross Powell What I did find, uh another comment that you made I found very interesting is that since there is the shared tipping model, that the employees are pushing out non-performers. So it's not left left up to the owner or the restaurant manager to say you're not performing, but the employees are doing it. Can you sort of expand on that a little bit?

SPEAKER_01 24:09

Aaron Powell It's it's anytime you get a team model where the team's dependent on each other, and if if my take-home pay is based on you doing contributing on the floor, and I don't see you on the floor, and I don't see you selling product or I don't see you supporting me in some way, I'm probably gonna complain, right? And those complaints eventually bubble up until there's some examination into why did why is everybody complaining about this person? Well, the reality is like the statistics don't support that they're selling, the other staff's not supporting their contributions in other ways, like you maybe you're doing something else. Um so it's sort of become self-regulating in in the sense that the other, assuming you have some good employees, um then they will naturally push out or identify the next question is do you act on that? Right? They voice all those complaints. Right. That person either has to be pushed out by management or they're gonna quit. So I know, at least from my management career, that you know good people will push out bad people. Um but if you don't if you don't escort those bad those underperformers out, the good people will also quit. Right. So they they really aren't super compatible. You you have to make sure you're listening.

What's Next for GoTab: Behavioral Data and Menu Analytics

SPEAKER_02 25:23

Aaron Powell No, I just love it. And and you know, the kind of data that is being generated by GoTab, it's just unprecedented. I mean, we didn't have access to that data. So you talked about um how um the the tab is following the person, and you know, regardless of where you are now. That's the kind of level of uh detail that we've never had passed in the other POS system. So we're fantastic. Um where do you go from here? I mean, you're already doing so much, so much detail. So what do you have mind uh to see an area of growth?

SPEAKER_01 25:54

Well, there's there's some really cool possibilities that arise when you move to QRs. Not to say that everybody should move to QRs, but there's some really cool things that become possible. Uh because my prior life was e-commerce. And in e-commerce, you don't just track what people buy, you actually track what they look at. You track who they're with, you track time of day, you track every single movement. So what we call behavioral data. So that behavioral data uh is maybe not um, you know, maybe you looked at the burger, but you didn't buy the burger. So the question is, why didn't you buy the burger? Did you not like some ingredient on it? Was there something else? What did you look at? How long did you linger on that? Um, there's a lot of data that we can use to educate ourselves uh on what guests like and what they don't like. Uh one really simple example is let's say you and I go to a restaurant and say, you pay because I paid last time. In a normal restaurant, I'm invisible because all they see is your data from your credit card. I'm sitting in their restaurant, yet they don't know that Tim McLaughlin ever even came there. Whereas in a QR model, both of our phones are there, or they know both of us are there. They know what we each separately ate. Maybe you're a vegetarian, maybe I'm not, but you paid for my hamburger, so they think you're a you're a hamburger eater, right? In in the old model. In the new model, I know which person prefers what. I know which person looked at what and which one they didn't. Um so there's a lot more data than people even realize. And I will actually say there's almost no operators even know how to take advantage of it, which is I'm hoping eventually we'll get to the point where people start understanding, hey, this is important data. Uh another piece of data that I think is really intriguing and we're trying to expose more, more easily or readily, is what are your basically your winners and your losers on your menu, especially if you're like a farm-to-table place, you're rolling out new product all the time, and people will come in and they'll try something. And one of the things I think about in hospitality is you have novelty and you have nostalgia. And they're two very different characteristics. Most people, like myself, they'll try anything once. That doesn't mean they like it. That just means they'll try it. Right. So you can give me some terrible beer, for example. There was a trend in beer where they would make like breakfast cereal beers. It's a terrible idea. Not, not nobody should ever pursue this. But they did it. And of course, then everybody went out and bought it because, hey, it's super novel. And guess what? It tasted terrible. So they never bought it again. But you could take that same signal to mean, oh, this is an amazing beer, Fruit Loops beer. Everybody wants that every day. The reality is that was just it was a misguided novelty, uh, fun for a quick one-hit, but never going to go far. Um so that kind of data is there. Um but separating out the signal from the noise is not uh not something everybody's doing

Fun Questions: What Is Tim Still Analog On?

SPEAKER_01 28:50

just yet.

SPEAKER_02 28:50

Aaron Ross Powell I think my data analytics faculty are gonna love this: separating the signal from the noise and all the data that you that you generate. So um for a bit of fun, we wrap up each podcast with a quick round of questions. As a technologist, what are you still analog on?

SPEAKER_01 29:08

Umerously in my household, we still read the print and newspaper. Uh I still get the economist in print. Uh so and I I try to minimize my screen time, although I don't always succeed after certain hours. So I'm you know, we play analog instruments. We you know we're I as much I have chickens in my backyard, if that gives you anyone. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 29:33

It does give me a very clear picture.

SPEAKER_00 29:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 29:36

I'm not gonna tell you what my daily screen time is on average. So I didn't say yeah. I didn't say I would I succeeded. But still, to be able to handle the chickens, you you necessarily have to get off your phone. You do. Yeah, there's no screens involved with chickens. Aaron Ross Powell Exactly.

Last Vacation: Greece and Watching Servers Use Personal Phones as POS

SPEAKER_01 29:52

Where did you go on your last vacation? Uh I'd say the most recent one of notice was Greece. We really enjoyed it. Um as I was mentioning earlier, it was fun watching how they do hospitality there. Food is amazing, of course. Um but I think I told you earlier, my my observation is that all the servers and all the restaurants are running the point of sale on their own personal phones. Uh so there's no dedicated devices, it's just their own handheld phone taking orders. Um it's kind of funny to see because I know that wouldn't fly in the

Running GoTab on Personal Devices and Apple Watch Notifications

SPEAKER_01 30:25

United States.

SPEAKER_02 30:25

Aaron Ross Powell But you're going to change our practice in the United States by having dedicated phones or dedicated instruments that restaurants can purchase at a very cheap cost.

SPEAKER_01 30:36

Aaron Ross Powell Yeah. I mean, you you can do that. You could also run on your on if you're a family-owned restaurant, there's no reason you can't run on your own phones. In fact, one of the things we do is we have the managers, because I wouldn't ask my rank and file staff maybe to install it on their personal phone. But a lot of managers don't want to be carrying around two devices, right? They've got their phone in their pocket and they've got a mobile POS. If given the choice, they'd rather just install the POS on their personal phone. So if they walk up to a guest and like, oh, I want to comp this, they can just do it on their iPhone, just less stuff to carry. And they can get notifications on their Apple Watch. Also, who wants to wear two Apple Watches? So it'd be much nicer to know that there's bad feedback on Table 33, because your Apple Watch just says, oh, guest at Table 33 said they had a bad experience.

SPEAKER_02 31:22

My goodness, this is an incredible amount of detail and technology. So let's talk about a recent TV series or movie that you've enjoyed recently.

Recent TV Recommendation: Only Murders in the Building

SPEAKER_01 31:32

I'll go with only murders in the building. It's a family-friendly-ish show. Except for the name of the Aaron Trevor Burrus, Except for the name. Yeah, and there's there's some murdering, but it's mostly pretty pretty mundane. It's it's hysterical and great people.

SPEAKER_02 31:46

I did have another question for you, but I think I already have the answer. Uh the promise of technology was it it would save us time. If we go with that notion, what's your favorite way to spend leisure time? I'm assuming it's taking care of the chickens or not at all. Something else. Okay. That's good. Let's go with that.

Favorite Leisure Activity: Hiking, Skiing, and the Outdoors

SPEAKER_01 32:05

Aaron Powell No, I'll go with uh hiking. I was just hiking yesterday. So if if there's anything that gets me into the mountains somewhere, I'm I'm happy. So it could be skiing, it could be hiking, running, any of the above.

Closing Remarks & Credits

SPEAKER_02 32:16

We will go with that answer. Thank you, Tim. It was a pleasure to talk with you today. And thank you, everyone, for listening today to our distinguished podcast. If you want to join the conversation and share your thoughts and suggestions, email me at shareden at bu.edu. That is s-a-de-e-a-n at bu.edu. Special thanks to the team who produced this podcast, Mara Littman, Andy Halleck, and the entire team at Boston University School of Hospitality Administration. To keep up with Distinguished Podcasts, be sure to subscribe wherever you listen to your favorite podcast. You can also learn more about our undergraduate and graduate programs at Boston University School of Hospitality Administration by visiting bu.edu slash hospitality. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 33:06

Thank you.