Survey suggests more restaurants may deploy self-service solutions

Self-service software provider NextChoice announced the results of a survey indicating that many of America's top restaurant executives are considering implementing more self-service technologies to improve customer satisfaction and control costs. Key findings include:

• Achieving better ROI and improving service were cited as key challenges.
• Respondents were most aware of MICROS, NCR, NextChoice and Radiant as leading self-service solution providers.
• Top self-service advantages: Accuracy, speed and store reporting.
• Top self-service challenges: Cost and point-of-sale (POS) integration.
• Top self-service features: Customer data capture, gift cards and web ordering.

Here's the press release, and here's a link to where you can download the whitepaper.

Tags: self-service, ordering kiosks, interactive kiosks, POS

McDonald's scores big with RedBox DVD rental kiosks

I just came across this great article about McDonald's RedBox DVD rental kiosks over at SeekingAlpha. In short: the company is going gangbusters, renting millions of DVDs, and spawning a multitude of competitors. To give you an idea of how amazing their growth is, check out this quote:

When I contacted Redbox to get clarification on the scope of the McDonald’s rollout, Redbox Vice-President of Marketing, Greg Waring said that “to begin with, we anticipate more than doubling our presence in the first half of next year. Exact markets and locations will be announced in the coming weeks.”

With McDonald's set to add at least another 800 kiosks in the first half of 2007 and with Redbox currently in beta testing at both Walgreens and Walmart, the future for DVD kiosks may be looking very bright indeed. What may have started as a hairbrained idea to diversify McDonald’s revenue beyond fast food has turned into a full blown DVD revolution. With McDonald’s having now rented over 15 million DVDs in the last 12 months at just their own 800 DVD locations, the economics of this expansion appear very compelling.

Compelling indeed. You can't say names like "Walgreens" and "Wal-Mart" without turning a few heads, and considering the diversity of venues that RedBox is considering (and having success with), it seems that the company identified a consumer need, even though similar services are already provided by pretty successful companies (a'la Netflix online, and Blockbuster/Hollywood Video in the brick-n-mortar world).

Image source: http://people.snapstream.com/wp-content/RedBox.jpg

Tags: RedBox, DVD kiosk, interactive kiosk, self-service, Coinstar, McDonald's