How Dante, a World Top 50 Bar, streamlines operations & avoids equipment downtime
Key successes
Company background
Dante NYC is a legendary circa-1915 cafe serving small plates & cocktails in an updated historic setting with two locations, a cafe in Greenwich Village and a restaurant in West Village. The New York Times described Dante as “The Italian cafe where New Yorkers sample la dolce vita”.
Dante was ranked #1 World’s Best Bar 2019 + Best Bar in America 2019 & 2020 (World's 50 Best Bars) and won the award for World’s Best Bar & Best American Restaurant Bar 2019 (TOTC Spirited Awards).
A lean team running like a startup
The owners of Dante, Linden Pride and Nathalie Hudson, are very involved in the everyday operations of each store much like startup founders and CEOs are. The team runs lean with Robert Aldridge, Director of Finance, also wearing multiple hats as one does running a tight ship.
Robert put on his operations hat and looked for a technology and service partner to help their already well-managed stores run more smoothly while ensuring the team documented all service orders and spend, eps as they grew from one location to two.
Challenge
Managing everything R&M without an operations department
Equipment repairs, upkeep, and labor costs were getting hard to keep track of with one store location being a cafe and a historic NYC favorite with old equipment that needed frequent repairs, to opening a new restaurant location with different pieces of equipment for different recipes. Robert knew they needed to put in some structure to keep track of the whole thing.
Keeping track of vendor invoices and payments was proving to be inefficient with vendor payment method preference being all over the map from credit cards to checks.
Without an operations department, Robert was looking for more than a software solution - he was looking for a solution partner to be an extension of the Dante team.
“In restaurants, there’s data coming from all different angles so you have to be organized and have processes in place to make sure everything is running properly. With repairs and maintenance accounting for 10% of our budget, we needed to bring structure to it.”
"Working with ResQ just made a lot of sense. I like structure and documentation, especially with 2 busy locations and 100 employees. Being a lean team requires us to be very organized and ResQ helped us to build structure and process, plus the data capture is all in one place. I no longer have to oversee every single detail in real-time."
Solution
A partner that’s on your side
After evaluating repairs & maintenance solutions for Dante, Robert, Nathalie, and Linden said ResQ was a “no-brainer” solution to implement. “It’s a good product, solves our R&M problems and is a low-risk solution,'' shared Robert.
1. Remove the stress of everyday operations
ResQ has removed the stress of everyday repairs & maintenance operations for the store staff, the owners, and the management team.
“The technology is very easy to use. New kitchen staff who come onboard can just pick it up and the software is pretty intuitive. We’re able to customize and put controls in place to approve if a repair needs to go through ResQ or if the owners need to review the issue before proceeding.”
“We use ResQ for everything from emergency repairs to setting up multi-year vent servicing contracts. NYC is a dusty environment so knowing ResQ is taking care of sourcing and overseeing the upkeep of our fridge compressors every quarter helps me focus on other areas of the business. We also have lots of new equipment in our second location so I now have data that’s accessible to me about warranty info and service history.”
Robert and the team also benefit from having ResQ’s team of experts available to help them along the way 24/7. Robert and his team know that ResQ will source and manage the right service professional for the job and if anything needs following up on, ResQ takes it on.
“We understand the other side of the business with vendor relationships - we want something that’s fair and don’t want to be taken advantage of. And ResQ is on our side.”
2. Give structure to R&M management
Being in finance, Robert needs data available at the end of each month to reconcile and close books. Having data available in one place is one advantage of ResQ and so is being able to pay all vendors through one system with full reporting capabilities which saves Robert much needed time.
3. The numbers make good business sense and it’s low-risk
“We looked at the cost of implementing ResQ vs the labor hours we’d have to spend on managing repairs ourselves and we immediately realized the savings potential. Plus, ResQ didn’t lock us in a 12-month contract and was a low-risk solution to implement.”
Never lose another dollar to inefficient R&M operations
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