La Varenne Group manages around fifteen restaurant establishments in Luxembourg, exemplifying a variety of concepts. It currently employs some 200 people. It was one of the first restaurant groups to open a food court in the Grand Duchy: the Food Village. Located in the KNAUF Shopping Centre in Schmiede, it has a bar, an à la carte restaurant, five food corners and can accommodate up to 800 people.
It was two years ago that, to better meet its current and future needs, La Varenne decided to integrate all its telephony and connectivity requirements on a single platform. “Our group has grown rapidly over the last ten years. Two years ago, during the health crisis, we decided to carry out a major rationalisation project focusing on our connectivity needs,” explained Sam Pinto, Managing Director of La Varenne Group. Up until then, each establishment had a dedicated telephone line. Each restaurant had its own contract with an operator. Given our needs, we wanted to combine all these telephony and connectivity services into a single contract. At the same time, we wanted to centralise the management of all our solutions in this area.”
A flexible solution
With this in mind, La Varenne turned to POST to implement a flexible solution that could grow with the company. “Our group is continuing to expand. There are plans in place to open new restaurants until 2025,” Sam Pinto continued. “In this context, as the running of each restaurant depends on access to our management systems, it was important for us to strengthen the security of our lines and ensure that we had a robust connectivity solution.” For example, the telephone exchange on which the group relied in the past still used analogue technologies. This out-of-date equipment exposed it to an ever-greater risk of service unavailability.
Improving accessibility
On POST’s recommendation, La Varenne opted for the Connected Office solution, which covers its fixed and mobile telephony and connectivity needs. All the group’s establishments are now connected to a single Cloud PBX telephone exchange, managed from the POST data centre. “Telephony is based exclusively on POST's integrated connectivity package. Internally, all we have to do is type in a two-number extension to get in touch with a restaurant team. From the customer's point of view, we can be sure that they’ll be able to reach us easily,” Sam Pinto commented. Nowadays, being accessible at all times, ensuring that no call is missed, is a key issue for this restaurant operator. “Since COVID-19, our takeaway business has grown by more than 40%. We need to be able to respond effectively to our customers at all times,” the Managing Director said.
Enhancing security
The POST solution implemented by La Varenne Group also incorporates solutions designed to secure exchanges between the restaurants and the Group’s central system. The task was to guarantee access to all restaurant management solutions, including accounting, stock management, hygiene compliance and human resources administration.
Ensuring a quality experience
For a restaurant, it’s not just a question of connecting the tills and payment terminals. High-quality Wi-Fi access must be offered to all customers. To meet this goal, POST also worked with the catering company, starting with a meticulous survey of the needs of each site in order to implement a connectivity solution that met expectations. “This was a major challenge for our Food Village in Schmiede, which can accommodate up to 800 people," said Sam Pinto. “Here, some 30 cash tills and payment terminals need to be permanently connected. In this space, the "Grand Café by La Varenne" concept, customers can sit down at any time of day for a drink and, if they want, work from their laptop by connecting to the Wi-Fi.”
So POST has made sure that this area is equipped with a Wi-Fi antenna to ensure optimum reception.
What’s more, La Varenne has no shortage of projects. One of its major undertakings over the coming months is the redevelopment of the food court in the Pommerloch shopping centre into a second Food Village. This one will be larger, expected to seat some 1,500 people, including Pizza Hut, which is located on the ground floor of the shopping centre. “Guaranteeing a quality experience in a place like this, by enabling everyone to connect to Wi-Fi easily without this affecting the performance of our business tools, is a real challenge. To achieve this, we need robust connectivity solutions, which POST is implementing for us,” concluded Sam Pinto.
