Case study · Food & beverage
Order ahead, skip the queue, earn the next one
Café chains lose customers at busy times to queues, and paper loyalty cards tell them nothing about who their customers are. This is how we built an app for ordering ahead and earning rewards, integrated with the tills so staff work the same way.
Project overview
Order-ahead and loyalty integrated with the tills.
- Industry
- Food & beverage
- Client
- Confidential
- Solution
- Loyalty and ordering app
- Platforms
- iOS + Android
- Timeline
- 12–18 weeks
- Team
- 5 people
- Payments
- Apple Pay, Google Pay, cards
- Integration
- POS / till system
- Sites
- 5–150
Expected business outcomes
What the client set out to achieve
Visit frequency and peak-time capacity are the measures.
-
10–20%
Higher visit frequency for app users
Rewards and offers bring customers back sooner.
Target range compared with non-app customers
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More
Orders handled at peak
Pre-orders spread demand and shorten queues.
Measured at peak hours
-
Known
Customer preferences
Orders and visits tied to customers with consent.
Where customers use the app
Business challenges
Where the client started
Loyal customers, but anonymous ones.
Loyalty
Paper stamp cards that get lost.
Queues
Morning peaks turn customers away.
Marketing
No way to reach regulars directly.
Data
Sales by product, not by customer.
Competition
Larger chains already offer order-ahead.
Proposed solution
What the app covers
Fast ordering and simple rewards, with the till as the source of truth.
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Order ahead
Menu, customisation and collection time at a chosen site.
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Payments
Wallet payments and saved cards through a secure provider.
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Digital loyalty
Stamps and rewards earned on app and till purchases.
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Offers
Personalised offers based on visits and preferences.
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Till integration
Orders appear on the till and kitchen screens; menus and prices sync.
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Insights
Visit frequency, reward redemption and app sales by site.
Project requirements
What the client asked us for
The request was an app like the big chains. The success factor is speed: ordering a usual drink should take seconds.
Till integration keeps staff workflows unchanged, which matters more than any feature.
What the project had to deliver
- 01Reorder a favourite in seconds
- 02Rewards without paper
- 03Orders straight to the till
- 04Offers that bring people back
Key challenges & considerations
What made it harder, and what we did
-
Till systems with limited APIs
What we did
The till integration was built and tested first, because ordering depended on it.
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Menu differences between sites
What we did
Menus were held per site, with central control of the shared items.
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Peak-time kitchen capacity
What we did
Order slots were limited at peak times to protect the kitchen.
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App store review timelines
What we did
Releases were submitted well ahead, leaving room for store review.
What we watched for
- Make reordering instant
- Integrate the till early
- Pilot at busy sites
- Respect kitchen capacity at peaks
Development process
Loyalty first, ordering second
Loyalty builds the user base; ordering adds convenience.
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Discovery
Customer and staff journeys mapped at busy sites.
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Till integration
Menu, price and order integration built.
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Loyalty release
Digital stamps and rewards launched.
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Ordering release
Order-ahead and payments launched at pilot sites.
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Rollout
All sites with offers and insights.
Technology stack
Consumer app with POS integration
Fast, reliable and connected to the tills.
Mobile
- React Native or Flutter
- Native modules where needed
- Offline storage
Backend
- Node.js or .NET API
- Azure or AWS
- Push notifications
Quality
- Automated UI tests
- Crash reporting
- Staged releases
Delivery
- CI/CD to App Store and Google Play
- Feature flags
Quality assurance & deployment
Tested on real devices, in real conditions
Mobile apps fail in the hands of users, not on a developer's desk. Testing covered real devices, poor networks and interrupted sessions before anything went to the stores.
- Automated tests for the app logic and the API
- Testing on real iOS and Android devices across the agreed versions
- Offline, poor-network and interrupted-session scenarios
- Code review on every change
- Store guideline checks during the build, not before submission
Deployment
- 01Ordering releaseOrder-ahead and payments launched at pilot sites.
- 02RolloutAll sites with offers and insights.
- 03Beta and store releaseA beta group used the app first; store submission followed, with a phased release.
- 04Monitoring and warrantyCrash and performance monitoring from launch, and six months of free bug fixing.
Final deliverables
Regulars you know by name
Customers order ahead and collect without queuing, earn rewards automatically and receive offers they care about.
The chain learns who its regulars are and what brings them back.
- Order-ahead
- Digital loyalty
- Till integration
- Customer insight
Handed over to the client
- 01iOS and Android appsPublished in the client's store accounts
- 02Source codeIn a repository the client can access
- 03Backend and adminDeployed and documented
- 04Release processBuild, signing and store submission
- 05Six-month warrantyFree bug fixing after delivery
Success metrics
How success is measured
| Measure | Outcome | How it is measured |
|---|---|---|
| Higher visit frequency for app users | 10–20% | Target range compared with non-app customers |
| Orders handled at peak | More | Measured at peak hours |
| Customer preferences | Known | Where customers use the app |
Verified reviews
What clients say about our mobile app work
Verified reviews from our clients on the same kind of work, published on Clutch.
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Mobile App Development
Web & Mobile App Development for a Software Company
Their communication skills and industry knowledge have left a strong impression on us.
Alec Wenzowski
President, Button Inc. Jan 2022 – Ongoing
-
Mobile App Development
Software & Mobile App Development
They were great people with great work ethic.
Henry Popp
Co-Founder, Codedge LLC Aug 2021 – Jan 2023
-
Mobile App Development
Mobile App Development for an IoT Company
The project manager does an excellent job, and the team is always available during the project.
Arjen Schoneveld
Co-Founder, Dexels BV Jun 2021 – Oct 2022
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