Success Story

Kountry Kitchen Finds Success In Taking Their Loyalty Program In-House

Mike and Theresa Adams appreciate both their customers and employees - and with some help from RestaurantOwner.com, have parlayed that sentiment into a stronger bottom line.

Last year, the couple brought their loyalty rewards system in-house. "We designed the system ourselves and implemented it all in about three months," says Mike Adams. "It has been a great success, and is much easier to use." They also saved between $600 and $700 a month, with no reduction in sales. "Having our own system allows our customers to set up their own accounts and monitor their status on their own."

The Adams' system also does not require a card, instead using the customer's name or phone number for identification. "They can sign up with nothing more than their phone number on the spot. Then they go, after the fact, to our loyalty site and update their info."

Every time he had to add customers manually, Adams recalls, it was "frustrating, and getting a monthly bill was hard to handle." The owners also found themselves under "constant pressure to offer more free stuff" from their loyalty rewards supplier.

Adams says he has become convinced that their approach "had lots of holes in it, not just from a system-design standpoint, but from their system philosophy." At low margins, every discount offered takes a good amount of sales to make up. The supplier's philosophy "seems to be to offer as many rewards as you can to get people in after an extended absence. We don't want those types of customers, and when they did come in they were all about the awards and discounts and not much more."

RestaurantOwner.com helped the Adams see the need from a loyalty system from the beginning, he recalls. "We also use RestaurantOwner.com any time we have an issue we need help with."

Adams says he is convinced the loyalty system did give him and his wife an increase in business. "We saw steady growth upon implementation." He concedes, however, that it is impossible to know what portion of the growth is due to the loyalty system "because we were growing prior to the system, also."

What Adams refers to as the "real" advantage of a loyalty system is that it keeps his restaurant's name in front of a customer who has a vested interest in reading its messages through the email-driven system.

'More Important than Our Customers'

"We have a belief about our employees that we shared with them this last year, and it had an impact we did not expect," Adams explains. "I think they feel we are really on their side; they understand now how much we care about them, and that we want only the best for them."

He and his wife published a statement about the fact that they believe their employees are "more important than our customers, and that we take their word over a customer's and stand up for them, even requesting that some customers do not return. Of course, they also know if we have great people, our customers get great service."

For the remainder of this year, Adams foresees steady growth and systems improvement as he fully implements his in-house automated inventory and ordering, cleaning schedules, and online recipe systems. "Completing our remodel will also have a major impact, as we will be able to seat more clients, and our kitchen - which is currently a bottleneck - will be able to turn tables faster."

Adams is also undertaking a major remodel, adding new ADA-compliant bathrooms and additional dining room and kitchen space. "We expect these changes to have major impact on sales, customer and employee satisfaction."