Mumbai food: The takeaway only got a makeover

Patel building comes opposite as usually another prosy plcae nearby Lower Parel railway station, in a line heading to a Mathuradas Mills Compound. However, a belligerent building has been buzzing with activity over a final few months. Work starts during 10 am when a staff arrives. By 10.30 am, a smoothness outpost starts unloading delicately noted food containers and packets. Around 11 am, a staff, many of them now dressed in kitchen clothes and protecting caps, rigging to take orders for 3 takeaway brands — Pao and Bao, Indus Opus and Pan of Asia.

The executive kitchen of Pao and Bao, Pan of Asia, and Indus Opus. PICs/Bipin Kokate

Meanwhile, operations have also started early morning in Marol, a centralised kitchen of Ceres Hospitality Pvt Ltd, a three-year-old start-up that owns Pao and Bao and Pan of Asia, and Morsel Products (that owns Indus Opus). In another partial of town, in Mahim, operations start during 5.30 am during a restaurant-cum-centralised kitchen of Feeast@East, a multi-chain grill that serves Kolkata-style rolls and Bengali food in a city. The two-and-half-year-old association recently non-stop an opening in Worli. While a Mahim outlet, that also serves as a centralised kitchen, is massive, other outlets are smaller.

Chef and owners Sougata Sengupta (right) during a centralised kitchen of Feeast@East, Mahim. Pic/Shadab Khan

Though a comparatively old-concept, centralised kitchens like these have re-emerged, permitting restaurateurs in a city to support to a wider public and control peculiarity opposite outlets. Charcoal, that serves biryani, recently started Chilli Flakes, a epicurean pizza smoothness space that runs from a same kitchen. There’s also Ammi’s Biryani, a multi-chain Mughlai takeaway service.

(From left) Deb Mukherjee and Harsh Patel of Ceres Hospitality

Economics of scale
“The judgment is to offer a 3 opposite brands to customers, regulating a same back-end, gripping costs down, and also charity products during an appealing price,” says Deb Mukherjee of Ceres Hospitality (co-founded with Harsh Patel) that runs a centralised kitchen in Marol.

The recognition of a judgment is some-more a need of a hour, as genuine estate prices soar city, says Sougata Sengupta, owners and owners of Feeast@East. “My regulating cost for a new opening has come down by some-more than 50 per cent” he says, citing a instance of his Worli opening that runs out of a 100 sq ft takeaway joint. “I would have been profitable during slightest R70,000 (per month) in rentals if we had to open an opening with a kitchen and chefs to prepared a food. But with this setup, we do n’t need some-more than an 100 sq ft area that costs me usually R20,000 a month,” he informs. “What this also means is that we don’t have to sinecure a comparison cook during each outlet,” agrees Mukherjee. The savings, from rentals, both say, have helped their companies, yield improved comforts to employees, and also sinecure well-trained hands from opposite India.

Quality control
“For a multi-chain eatery like ours, progressing a same ambience and peculiarity opposite outlets was a plea that carrying a centralised kitchen solved,” says Sengupta, adding, “We semi-prep many equipment (barring Chinese) like breads, fillings, sauces, curries or marinades for chicken, lamb and mutton, and low sums, in advance, and ride it to a locations on a same day. Thus, we are means to control ambience and peculiarity and say it opposite outlets.”

Feeast@East has hired taxis that ride food from Mahim to all a outlets opposite a city along with a lerned staff. By 11, they are during their stations, prepared to offer Kolkata Rolls, biryani, and creatively prepared Chinese dishes. “All a staff has to do is, feverishness a food, and offer it to a customers,” adds Sengupta. But while Sengupta runs usually one brand, (Feeast@East), Mukherjee and his group have managed to launch 3 takeaway brands regulating a same assembly. Pao and Bao that serves break bites, Pan of Asia serves Chinese delicacies while Indus Opus specialises in Indian cuisine like curries, parathas and rice preparations like biryani. Until now, Mukherjee and his group have been sincerely successful. “The 3 brands have already damaged even (R15k per day business) in Marol and Lower Parel, and we are anticipating to grasp a same in Powai soon,” says Mukherjee. The initial outpost leaves Marol around 8.30 am. It reaches Powai by 9.30, and thereafter, heads to Lower Parel reaching there during 10.30 am.

While a process helps standardize peculiarity opposite outlets, Mukherjee informs that a biggest bonus had been reduced prolongation time that enables quicker deliveries. “Fast deliveries are of pinnacle significance for any takeaway brand. Every quick smoothness means a happy customer, that in spin relates to them meditative of us subsequent time they confirm to sequence food,” he reasons.

Tech matters
But all of this wouldn’t have been probable but record ancillary several behind finish operations like register management, indicate of sale and call centres, to forestall waste due to wastage by regulating intelligent metrics.

Ceres uses a cloud-based end-to-end complement supposing by Torqus, a tech startup, that links call centres to each indicate of sale section during an opening and to a register there as good as during a executive kitchen. So, a impulse a apportionment of Biryani or Bao is ordered, a complement automatically updates a register during a takeaway kitchen as good as a bottom kitchen. “We accept orders from mixed points — a call centres, websites of a 3 takeaways as good as around food aggregators like Swiggy and Zomato. The complement helps us lane all of them together during one point, and takes into comment a normal sales in a week, and as per demand, it creates an sequence list for a satellite sites. It also annals any singular spikes on sold days of a week, and adjusts sequence sizes accordingly” reveals Mukherjee.

Feeast@East relies on a point-of-sale complement supposing by Posist, that is related to a third-party register government complement called Lime Tray. All program is mapped to a certain smoothness area. As shortly as an sequence is placed, it’s sent to a location, and updated.

But a biggest advantage that formation of record with a business indication of a centralised kitchen has introduced is that Mukherjee and Sengupta can lane each notation fact of a eateries on their smartphones — from a standing of an order, to their daily/weekly opening to a register standing from anywhere in a world. “I have an app that we can use to check minute-by-minute sales by channels. we am wakeful during any indicate how a sold section is doing what kind of sale in genuine time. The patron also gets intimated about it. If it’s pouring in Lower Parel, we can indoctrinate a program to give visit updates to customers. We aim to broach in 45 minutes. It also keeps a add-on on his form and past orders. It helps us pull products,” explains Mukherjee.

Related Posts

• Citing sporting icons, experts speak about how to stay ease in vicious moments
• In speak with Sathya Saran, author of `Breath of Gold: Hariprasad Chaurasia`
• Cosplay and fun: Attend this two-day pop-up in Mumbai this weekend