Hopdoddy tests kea’s voice ordering system with the goal of expansion across 47 restaurants

Handmade burger bar, Hopdoddy, is a people-first kind of restaurant. That means both guests and team members come first over anything else. When Hopdoddy’s restaurants started experiencing a busier-than-usual dinner rush post-Covid, management noticed team members were getting stressed. 

Jennifer Faren, the VP of Marketing at Hopdoddy remarked, “When team members are too busy to get to the phone, knowing that a guest is on the other line, they worry that they can’t help everyone. So we knew they needed a solution that improved their experience and the guest experience too.”

With kea, guests and team members can be at ease knowing the phone is answered every time it rings and that there’s always a “human in the loop” on the other end of the AI. Using natural language processing, kea triages incoming calls, transcribes, upsells, and confirms orders, then processes payment with a PCI-compliant system. 

Exclusively selected for Olo’s partner program, kea can integrate into any restaurant using Olo’s e-commerce platform and automatically send phone orders to said platform. If a guest ever needs more assistance or the call drops, there’s always a kea operator that will interject and speak to the guest in real-time. 

So, Hopdoddy decided to work with kea to test its system at 10 different locations first, with plans to expand into all 47 locations over time. 

“It’s important to us that AI makes jobs easier and doesn’t take away the human element. So we strive to work with restaurants that are aligned with that vision,” said Adam Ahmad, CEO and Founder of kea. “Knowing Hopdoddy is a high-quality burger bar with even higher standards, we’re honored that kea meets these standards. We’re looking forward to supporting team members that really care about what they do so they can be present in the restaurant.”