Beef ‘O’Brady’s Tests Native Delivery

Beef 'O' Brady's is among the full-service restaurants that leaned into an off-prem model.

The franchises have taken to social media to stay in touch with their fans and to share what’s going on with the brand including their new offerings, says Heather Boggs, CMO for FSC Franchise Co., the franchisor of Beef 'O' Brady's. 

“There are more eyeballs on social media than there ever has been,” she says. FSC provides creative that can be tweaked and used by the franchises on Instagram and Facebook. “There’s a positive and optimistic feel to the message,” Boggs says. Some franchisees are channeling their creativity and doing TikTok videos, she adds.

No Drive-Thru? No Problem!

Beef 'O' Brady's is among the restaurants that added pop-up drive-thrus in the restaurant's parking lot and virtual pop-up locations. Most of Beef 'O' Brady's 138 locations are in-line and not freestanding, she explains. The virtual pop-up drive-thru were created with a “very minimal” list that includes a logo, tent and cones.  “As fast as we could we made banners, flags and signs,” she adds. Using social media, a Beef 'O' Brady's franchise promotes they’re taking orders and were dropped off in a predesignated location from the Beef 'O' Brady's pop-up tent. Customers ordered and prepaid. The brand uses Toast's POS, and the cloud-based system ”allowed us to embrace off-premises and the delivery aspect,” Bogg explains.

Now that dining rooms are reopening, Beef 'O' Brady's has ceased pop-up drive-thrus. 

Locations are also using third-party delivery services, and some franchises are testing native or in-house delivery. “Some of the locations that have opted-in to self-delivery have been very successful, and it's been their #2 sales driver, beating our several third-party delivery platforms such as UberEats,” Bogg says. “It is something that many of our franchisees are looking to add, and we're utilizing online ordering to do so.”

Some locations do have curbside ordering and curbside pickup. And while 90% of online orders are paid for online, there’s still that small percent that pay during pickup. Franchises have handhelds to process payments and also accept cash.

“We are looking for unique ways to keep employees on the payroll,” Boggs says.

The 35-year-old sports bar brand is adapting to the times by offering different variations of their regular food and beverage menus for to-go orders, as well as beer and wine for delivery.

“People don’t want to cook three meals a day,” Boggs says.

Locally owned and operated franchises are part of their communities, so when the country first shut down, select locations stepped up to the plate and delivered groceries. Customers needed "our support and  a safe way for customer to access food outside of a grocery store,” said Boggs.  Now that the country has reopened, the franchises have stopped offering staples such as milk, cheese, produce, meats, condiments and sauces.