The George, Tiffield
"Tabology is spot on. When you have a system that you use every bit of functionality on, that's the system for you." Michael Pearson, Licensee.
The George at Tiffield is a village pub close to Towcester, Northamptonshire, with great food and drink complemented by popular events such as acoustic and open mic music nights, and regular pub quizzes.
The pub has also reinforced its place at the heart of village life with the opening of a shop, using Tabology’s pub EPOS system to process sales of both pub food and drink, as well as groceries and other essentials sold by the shop.
Licensees Martin Steele and Laura Cook began using Tabology in early 2021, having taken over the pub the previous year. Martin says, “we’re very much a village pub, with mainly local trade.” The George has a large garden as well as two indoor trading areas, and part of the initial appeal of Tabology’ EPOS was the ability to take mobile orders while the pub had to offer outside service, and then table service only, in response to Covid regulations. “That has been very useful.”
The George serves a regularly changing range of beers, a full drinks range including hot drinks, and supplements its core food menu with specials from Thursday to Sunday, which can include favourites such as liver & bacon, Thai curry, slow cooked beef short ribs and other freshly prepared dishes, often spotlighting local suppliers.
“Food is about 25% of total trade, but it’s very important to us,” says Martin. All food and drink products are listed on the EPOS, enabling staff to take orders with a touch of a button. Two printers are linked to the EPOS, with food orders sent to one in the kitchen, while another prints receipts in the bar.
“We’re adding new products all the time, and taking others off, which Tabology makes very simple,” says Martin. “For new beers and guest ales, we can pull in the brewers’ descriptions and tasting notes directly from the Untappd website with a simple widget on the EPOS.
“For specials, we have menu boards to say what’s on, and we have buttons on the EPOS called ‘Special 1’ and Special 2’ so staff can take the order. If we need to update the price, depending, on what the dish is, we can do that easily.”
The village shop was initially a response to Covid, as many local residents were unable to travel and there was also a need to help combat the social isolation of lockdown. The response to the offer means the shop is now a permanent addition, allowing The George to broaden their revenue stream. “Initially the shop was to help people who couldn’t get out, but they still use the shop now, so we’ve kept it going.”
"We use Tabology’s digital menu screens, which are linked directly to the EPOS displaying the products available from the shop, changing to reflect availability, with much of the produce coming freshly from local suppliers."
Martin also praises the support available from Tabology. “If we ever have any issues, we just put a message on the WhatsApp and they get back to us in no time at all. For example, when we weren’t sure how to put a discount onto a product, and they talked us through it and also sent us a video link. They also talked us through resetting the printers when we needed to.”
To find out more about our Pub EPOS, and how it could work in your venue, get in touch.
