The Paramount Group - Caterease
How eGuide streamlined Drop-off operations utilizing Caterease to decrease labor needs and increase volume capabilities.
Overview:
Caterease is one of the nation’s largest catering software companies and an ideal fit for off-premise catering and events. Paramount Events, a Chicago based catering and event company have been utilizing Caterease since their inception in 2011. As the business has increased annual revenue on an average of 30% - 40% annually Caterease has been the primary software used for communicating orders, production paperwork, and event details from the sales teams to operation, culinary, and production departments.
While most full-service events include custom menus, for the Paramount Events Drop off teams the menus tend to be more finite, allowing the company to explore more order processing tools built-in to the Caterease Platform. eGuide was given the task to increase efficiency in the order processing, fulfillment, and production process for the Drop Off team.
“eGuide Tech Allies provides complete IT support for all of our systems. After reviewing the software, they tweaked and integrated some of the systems with each other to improve our processing capacity.”
Approach:
Analyze Current Process: To make accurate assessments, we first reviewed the current process of receiving, processing, and fulfilling orders. We met one-on-one with representatives from the sales team, culinary, and operations team to isolate what was working well, and what needed improvement. Knowing where common errors were made we honed in on what needed to be done to improve the process and where the efficiencies could be created.
Identify KPI’s & Software Enhancements: Reiterating the key performance indicators to Paramount Events executives allowed us to ensure the project was addressing the known concerns from each department, and also allowed us to communicate our findings in a transparent manner. Utilizing our knowledge of Caterease we were able to effectively identify what enhancements could be made to eliminate steps and create efficiencies.
Develop a Project & Implementation Plan: eGuide doesn’t stop with consulting, and we were brought on to manage the implementation of the findings. Utilizing the MOCHA methodology we were able to identify who the key players were and what their roles would be during the process. Assigning key dates to the implementation plan kept each department accountable and identified cross over and collaboration. The project plan ensured that the enhancements were clear, tested, and implemented in a meaningful way.
Oversee Training & Change Management: Once the new process was tested, we ensured that the key players were equipped with the proper tools to train their teams and actualize the new process. With any change, there are those users that may need additional support and eGuide was there to assist in the process.
Results:
Conclusion:
As a growing small business, Paramount Events was able to implement the changes we brought about to increase revenue, increase user competency, and reduce labor costs. While Caterease is a platform dedicated to the events and hospitality industry, many database platforms are equipped to significantly increase efficiency. Using the same logic eGuide is positioned to apply the same project metrics to other database management systems.
