HT Profiles Industry Heroes Award Winners
The winners of the 2021 Industry Heroes Awards are:
CMX. CMX launched its COVID-19 Response, Reopening & Recovery Kit, providing fast-casual and quick-serve restaurants with out-of-the-box templates for Employee Wellness Checks, Health and Sanitation Shift Logs, COVID-19 Related Incident Reporting, and Reopening Checklists. Industry Hero CMX Helps Restaurants to Deliver on COVID Response
Concept Entertainment Group. When Concept Entertainment Group halted dive-in service at its Thirsty Lion locations due to the pandemic, it pivoted to create an online food hall concept called Central Kitchen to house online dining concepts of different genres integrated within Thirsty Lion’s kitchens — allowing customers to order a variety of food via third-party delivery and pickup. Read more about Concept Entertainment Group's Online Food Hall Concept With Multiple Virtual Brands.
Dickey's Barbecue Pit optimized its e-commerce site for mobile users, contributing to an immediate 42% increase in digital sales — and restructured two franchisee-facing resources to give franchisees improved access to hundreds of resources directly from their mobile devices. Read the full profile on why Dickey's Barbecue Pit receives HT's Industry Hero Award here.
Fazoli’s. Fazoli’s saw record-breaking sales and traffic in 2020 thanks to a streamlined pivot to drive-thru and curbside and to contactless payments — as well as providing a special promotion to restaurant industry workers and providing meals to essential workers from hospital personnel to police and fire departments. Read more about this Industry Hero's slick shift to Off-Prem, and read about Fazoli's Johanna Miner, a Top Women in Restaurant Technology Lifetime Achievement Award Winner, and her leadership role in this project.
Jersey Mike’s Franchise Systems Inc. Jersey Mike’s robust e-commerce platform allowed it to move seamlessly to accommodate increased online orders and third-party and native delivery — while, early on, to provide financial relief to customers, the brand offered several discounted promotions and also donated more than $4.5 million to Feeding America. Read the full article, Industry Hero: Jersey Mike’s Gives Back.
OneDine. OneDine offered its Park – Order – Pay product to thousands of restaurants, no matter the size, location, or menu, at no cost and no obligation, enabling restaurants to turn their parking spaces into revenue-generating real estate via large QR codes printed on free-standing signs, often onboarding in less than 72 hours. Read more on why OneDine Receives Hospitality Technology’s Industry Hero Award.
Punchh. Punchh’s customer loyalty and engagement solutions enabled restaurant brands to foster and maintain vital connections with their guests in the middle of a pandemic, driving frequency and sales for its customers, and delaying billing and waiving fees in some cases to help brands stay profitable while adjusting their services to the changing times. Watch Punchh receive Hospitality Technology’s Industry Hero Award.
Revel Systems. Revel debuted a new standalone online ordering solution, Revel Go, that could be added to a business’s operations regardless of their POS solution, and also created the Revel Relief Program, allocating $1 million in relief funding for clients experiencing excessive hardship due to COVID-19. Read more on why Revel Systems receives Hospitality Technology’s Industry Hero Award.
Top Women in Restaurant Technology and Industry Heroes winners were chosen by Hospitality Technology magazine and members of its Research Advisory Board. Winners are profiled in the Summer 2021 issue of Hospitality Technology magazine.