It might not really take a village to raise a child and although it doesn’t work well as a joke, it really does take only one (insert profession here) to change a light bulb. While many things aren’t as difficult as we portray them to be, some things are. Imagine the scope and labor involved in preparing meals for casino or hotel guests around the clock. All jokes aside, it takes a small army.
Unfortunately, labor is expensive. Labor accounts for more than 40 percent of all operating costs. However, attempts to cut costs by reducing labor can be detrimental to large-scale foodservice operations such as lodging and casinos; it can impact food quality, prep time and, ultimately, their business. Similarly, hiring additional staff to increase productivity can be expensive. Since lodging and casino operations are consistently being asked to do more with less, greater attention is being paid to equipment as a means to increase productivity without hiring additional staff.
In his Foodservice Equipment and Supplies magazine blog, Mark Godward, president of SRE, suggests foodservice operations “use equipment as a means to achieve operational objectives, such as improved food safety and quality, faster cooking times and reduced footprint.”
So where do lodging and casino operations begin? The first step is evaluating foodservice equipment to determine if it is being used as efficiently as possible. Take Hobart’s Combi® Oven, for example. For versatility and productivity, it’s the perfect combination. It lets chefs shorten cooking times by combining steam mode and convection mode in any sequence they want. Programmable for up to 100 different recipes, the oven can be used for baking, grilling, roasting, steaming, proofing, rethermalization and low-temp cooking.
Before breads, pastries and pasta make it to a guest’s plate, they often begin life in a mixer. It might be hard to view mixers as leaders of efficiency, but they have evolved into timesaving tools. Hobart’s Legacy® Mixer is the only mixer that has a swing-out bowl, making it easy to add ingredients, take out product, and remove and mount bowls. Some people might not think that feature is important, but when one considers that mixers are used several hours a day, the time savings can quickly add up.
Blast chillers are another great example of how equipment can increase productivity. In approx-imately 90 minutes, Traulsen Blast Chillers can improve productivity by taking prepared foods safely through the Danger Zone—135 degrees Fahrenheit to below 41 degrees Fahrenheit—so that staff can heat and serve food up to one week later. The staff can maximize the productivity of shifts and receive the highest return on their food investment.
Once food is chilled, it needs to be brought back up to serving temperature as quickly as possible. Traulsen insulated rethermalization ovens help foodservice professionals reheat previously prepared, stored and chilled food to serving temperature, all while retaining the food’s color, flavor, texture and nutrients. They can heat chilled foods from 40 degrees Fahrenheit to a predetermined serving temperature—up to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
Heated holding cabinets offer another way to increase productivity. They keep food at a safe holding temperature—between 135 degrees Fahrenheit and 180 degrees Fahrenheit—so staff can serve hot meals at a moment’s notice. Air curtains let staff work with the refrigerator door open for up to an hour for maximum productivity in the kitchen, all the while keeping the food safe and cool.
With so many products on the market, it’s not always easy to determine the best equipment for a specific situation. That’s why it’s important to work closely with equipment manufacturers to better understand how various pieces of equipment can improve productivity.
“I feel very strongly about equipment manufacturers’ responsibility to share their clients’ business challenges,” Godward writes in his blog. “If a supplier does not understand their clients’ challenges, how can they contribute to their customers’ success? That commitment is what will make a supplier a valued partner versus a vendor, and allow both client and supplier to grow together.”
The lodging and casinos industry is definitely a people business. Whether it’s the friendly, welcoming smile of the concierge or the chef’s extra detail added to the plate that makes for a great presentation, it’s people who can make all the difference. The key is doing more with the people and equipment you have.
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