Team Howard recently set up the Frequent Diner Program at the Brickyard Tavern & Grill in Ballston Spa, NY. We worked closely with owners Ron Manna and Glen Greco to create a user friendly program with a few basic goals.

1. Easy for Brickyard customers to join the Frequent Diner program
2. The process of “tagging” guest checks of Frequent Diner customers need to be fast and easy
3. The Frequent Diner point system (rewards) needs to be uncomplicated
4. Point redemption needed to be simple
5. Administrative cost to monitor the program must be minimal

For their Frequent Diner program, Ron & Glen decided to use a very creative spin on words and refer to the program as a way for their customers to “build bricks” while dining at the Brickyard. We then built a Frequent Diner program based upon their goals listed above.

Easy for customers to join the Frequent Diner program.
To accomplish this we designed a Frequent Diner Application using Digital Dining’s Check Layout feature. The Frequent Diner application is printed on the bottom of the diner’s guest check. Customers fill out the application and start building bricks. The Brickyard gets valuable information through this process; e-mail address, birthdays, anniversaries etc.

The process of “tagging” guest checks of members needs to be fast and easy.
To accomplish this we established a check option button titled “Frequent Diner”. When a server taps this button, the Digital Dining system prompts for the member’s phone number. The server indexes the phone number (the area code is not required as we set up 518 as a default area code, which saves time), the Digital Dining system prompts any member’s name that uses that phone number, the server then taps the appropriate name.
This entire process takes less than 10 seconds.

The Frequent Diner point system (rewards) needs to be uncomplicated.
The Brickyards point system is simple. Members earn one brick for every dollar spent on food and beverage. Members do not earn bricks for the money they spend on sales tax and gratuities. Ten bricks equal one dollars worth of credit. Once a member’s check is tagged as a frequent diner, the Digital Dining system will automatically print that member’s total bricks earned to-date. The guest check also includes a line that asks the diner to declare if they would like to redeem their bricks or let the bricks ride (diner’s can redeem a portion, all, or none of their bricks).

Point redemption needed to be simple.
To accomplish this we added a bricks button (credits) to the payment screen. While on the payment screen, a server can simply tap “Redeem Bricks”. The Digital Dining system then prompts for the brick amount (naturally a server can not redeem more bricks than a diner has earned); server inputs a portion or all of the bricks the diner indicated they wanted to redeem. That’s it. Can or corn.

Administrative cost to monitor the program must be minimal.
After the program was set up, the only real back of the house (BOH) function is to enter new members into the Frequent Diner program. There are other BOH functions pertaining to Digital Dining’s Frequent Diner program though. The Brickyard owners will be able to (at their convenience) print and establish the following information and functionality:

1. Customer Reports to analyze frequent dining/delivery sales figures and generate mass or marketing mailings based on points, interests, or special occasions. Digital Dining provides six different report formats for this report.
2. The Sales Summary format of the Customer Report allows you to generate a report that summarizes the purchasing history of each frequent dining/delivery customer.
3. The Complaints Report allows you to generate a report that lists the name and address of each frequent dining/delivery customer who submitted a complaint for the date range or period you provide.
4. Analyze check averages based upon your frequent diner sales.
5. Use Frequent Dining Plan Reports to analyze the volume of activity for each frequent dining plan. Digital Dining provides two different report formats for this report.
6. Frequent Dining Plan Reports allow you to generate reports that will list each frequent dining/delivery transaction for the date range or period you provide. Detail total purchase value, credits redeemed, credit earned, credit cost etc.
7. Use No Sale Reports to analyze any inactivity of frequent Diner members.
8. If using multiple Frequent Diner Plans, you can analyze and compare those plans as pertains to each plans total sales and their associated costs.
9. Use the e-mail blaster to send emails to Frequent Diner members informing them of future food & drink specials, live entertainment, karaoke, Football specials etc.