The National Restaurant Association Show just wrapped up and with it came a slew of technological innovations for the restaurant industry. Every corner of the show seemed to beam with some new shining invention. It was a fantastic year for tech in general, with Daniel Burns (a renowned futurist) taking the stage at the show to discuss the future of food. Let's sidebar the futurism for a moment and talk about the present; Here are the top 3 showstoppers from this year's National Restaurants Association Show.
Top 3 Gadgets
Magical Ice Cleaning Technology
The new Bi-Polar Ice was debuted at the show. This new product has the sole purpose of removing waste from your ice machine. How does it do that? We're glad you asked. Little carbon fiber brushes are attached to the ice machine that sucks up existing water vapor and releases positive and negative ions into your ice machine. So what does that do? Well, these ions attach to contaminants in the ice tank converting them to water vapor. This allows the process to repeat indefinitely. It may not be magic, but it's about as close as science gets to it.
Super Oven
Alto-Shaam let the industry take a closer look at their new Vector F Series Multi-Cook Oven at this year's show. Rumors of the oven have been floating around for a while now, and the newest model looks to improve on the popular Vector-Series that Alto-Shaam has been mastering for some time now. The new model offers insane temperature flexibility and fan speed in its multiple independent chambers. All while using its Structured Air Technology to give focused heat to food, preventing turning and rotating.
Make-Line Dreams
Any foodservice business that has a make-line will surely be jumping for joy at the new Genius Pan. This is one of those "How did I not think of that?" inventions. The genius pan is a food container that has rotating tabs that push food back up to the top. It may sound simple, but this innovation will increase presentation and reduce waste at just about every make-line establishment around.
Some Take Home Learnings from the Show
Besides the tech, the show had lots of conferences. Each one of them was jam-packed with useful information. We couldn't possibly list everything but here 3 takeaway points from the show.
- Waste management was a big theme this year. Waste reduction is becoming more integral for your business and is a great way to start cutting away at the bottom line. As shown with the Bi-Polar Ice, technology is making this simpler every day.
- Reducing inefficiencies (something we specialize in) had a lot of time dedicated to it. And why not? It's probably the single biggest thing affecting your bottom line.
- Revenue Growth relies on product, employees, and waste. All of these were heavily focused on during the two Restaurant Revenue Growth Conferences held at the Marriott Marquis Chicago.
If you are in the foodservice business and think any of those gadgets look great, why spend all of your time on fancy new products when you still have outdated, cost-heavy, and inefficient training methods? Check out our free ebook "10 Reasons to Leverage a Modern Learning System" to see how improved training should be the first shiny new thing in your business. Gadgets can save time and reduce waste, but employee training is integral to promoting revenue growth.
