How Selflane Simplified Order-Taking for This Ramen Bar

Slirpy noodles, tasty hot broth that will have your palates dancing, a perfect seasoned egg, the most tender slice of pork belly you’ll ever eat, and a ‘naruto’ to top it all off — these are the comforting characteristics that you’ll find in a bowl at Naruto Ramen. This hole-in-the-wall restaurant was opened in late 2015. Today, it is voted as the second best ethnic restaurant by UNM students.

Challenge with the Previous POS

Before Naruto opened, the owner, Hiro Fukuda and manager, Sachiko Newton, were seeking for an efficient and quick way for the servers to take orders. They came across a POS system that allows servers to take care of customers all from an iPad. While this POS had many great features and provided everything that Hiro and Sachiko were looking for, it caused frustration for the servers because the software had increasing glitches, which slowed down productivity. “There were also other issues such as the system shutting down spontaneously, and the printer disconnecting” says Sachiko. The problems with the previous POS were persistent, causing the employees to stop everything to troubleshoot the problems. Naruto continued utilizing this POS thinking that there wasn’t another POS that would be better than what they had.

In March of 2018, a solution presented itself. Kevin Zhou, co-founder of Selflane walked into Naruto and introduced himself along with Selflane.

How Selflane Simplified Everything

Kevin’s presentation and his passion for his brand was enough to convince Sachiko to switch over to Selflane. The servers were able to understand the system within a matter of hours. “I love that this system is so easy to use. You can tell that Kevin and Charlie (Kevin’s partner) truly care about their customer satisfaction and are very responsive when you reach out to them about a problem. They will also take action to solve the problem as soon as possible” commented Sachiko.

Their Results

Fast and organized system

There are times when Naruto is busy and chaotic. The servers feel at ease knowing that the orders are taken care of in the kitchen the moment they tap ‘send’. Any orders that need to be modified (i.e. adding or taking out an item) is easily done by tapping the ‘edit order’ button. Selflane is also continuously updating their app to further simplify this aspect. Another great aspect about Selflane is its ability to keep the customers who are coming in and leaving organized. Servers are able to see on their iPads which tables are occupied, how long the customers have been dining or waiting for their food, and which tables are open. One thing that the servers appreciate most is how the tips are adjusted with Selflane. All past orders are numbered, and once you adjust a tip, it immediately goes over to the folder of tips that are already adjusted, keeping everything organized. Sachiko mentioned that checking out customers is also done without any stress. The bill can be split in any way possible, and the system is able to process credit/debit cards within 10 seconds or less it seems. Overall, Selflane makes everyone’s lives easier at work. All we have to do is take care of our role, and Selflane does the rest.

Satisfied customers

Before using Selflane, Sanchez had to contact third party companies for his POS whenever things would go south, like the credit cards not processing, for instance. Now, whenever there is a problem, he is able to call Kevin and the issue is taken care of. The single point of contact saves you from having to scramble through your contacts; it also proves that Selflane is reliable during times of crisis.

Simple to Use

As mentioned above, Selflane is a fast and organized system. This system ensures that every customer will feel prioritized. If a customer is in a hurry and needs to eat and go, servers can take care of that customer on the spot and have them checked out in no time. Customers don’t have to worry if their orders will be wrong because Seflane is accurate 99% of the time. If a server or the kitchen staff made a mistake, the modification feature will allow the server to fix the problem without any hassles. The timer on the occupied tables is also a good reminder for servers on how long the customers have been waiting — so if the customer has been waiting for over 15 minutes for their food, the servers can take action to tend to the customer(s).

Increase in sales

It is estimated that in the past year, since using Selflane, Naruto’s daily sales has increased by about 15%. If the customers are happy with the service at Naruto or any restaurant for that matter, they will want to return, correct? Another addition to Naruto’s increase in sales is due to Selflane’s online ordering platform. “We love the online orders from Selflane most compared to the other online ordering platforms because Selflane automatically prints the customer’s order. The servers don’t have to worry about the order whatsoever. All they have to do is package it really” commented Sachiko.