SOTEC distributed the Edge Gateway device, the CloudPlug, and implemented the Drive-thru timing system for McDonald’s UK that collects real-time data from all Drive-thru restaurants to create real-time and historic reporting data.
The challenge
To keep customer satisfaction high, the speed of service is a key figure. To get a full picture of the speed of service, correct and comparable data is required. Reviewing all timing sections and potential bottlenecks within the Drive-thru lane is key. By creating comparability between the restaurants, the crews can be encouraged to improve customer service and thus increase customer satisfaction.
The solution
The SOTEC CloudPlug IoT Gateway is installed in the restaurant and sends data from sensors in the drive lane and the POS system in real-time to an AppEngine app. The data is aggregated and stored in BigQuery – all secured by McDonald’s Global Authentication Service (GAS) which is also integrated. The restaurant can see its own performance report and how it performs in relation to other sites.

The results
Over 800 restaurants are currently participating in DTS and in the meantime, the solution is being deployed to restaurants in Ireland too. The solution has reduced the waiting time in the Drive-Thru lane and improved the overall customer satisfaction rate for restaurants since the dashboard was enabled.
This is what the customer says:
When we started the "Drive-Thru Timing System" project with SOTEC in 2015, our goal was to get live insight into the health of your market-wide drive operations, to see car movements and sales immediately. Now we are very pleased to continue to expand this system together with SOTEC as our chosen Software as a Service Partner.
McDonalds UK