A lunch rush is usually shorter than it feels. Most of the money comes in during a small window, and every minute a customer waits in it is a chance they walk out. You can't make the window longer, so the only option is to get more orders through it.
Before hiring someone for those hours, it's worth finding where the time actually goes.
Find the real bottleneck
Stand back for one rush and watch. The queue is almost always waiting on one of three things:
- Taking the order and payment. Customers deciding at the till, questions about options, card machines.
- Making it. One coffee machine, one sandwich station, one person on each.
- Handing it over. Calling names, finding the right bag, people crowding the pick-up point.
Fixing the wrong one does nothing. A second till won't help if the espresso machine is the limit.
If ordering is the bottleneck
- Shorten the lunch menu. Fewer choices means faster decisions. Keep the full menu for quieter hours.
- Show prices and options clearly before people reach the till, so they arrive ready to order.
- Take ordering off the counter. A QR code at the start of the queue lets people order and pay on their phone while they wait. Our post on counter ordering for takeaways explains how that works in practice.
- Put table codes on seats. Guests who are already sitting down can order without coming back to the till at all.
If making is the bottleneck
- Prep the slowest items before the rush. Portioned fillings, pre-made sandwich bases, soup ready to ladle.
- Batch similar orders. When a screen shows the whole queue, staff can see three flat whites coming and make them together.
- Mark sold-out items straight away. Every order for something you've run out of costs time twice: once to take it, once to sort it out.
If handing over is the bottleneck
- Use order numbers as well as names. Two customers called Sam will happen.
- Set up one clear pick-up point away from the till, so the queue and the collection don't block each other.
- Tell customers when it's ready. If their phone updates when the order is marked ready, they don't need to crowd the counter. Café QR's counter codes do this with an on-screen alert and a chime.
Measure it
Pick one change at a time and compare two similar days. Useful numbers:
- Orders per 15 minutes at the peak.
- How long the queue is at its longest.
- How many people leave the queue without ordering.
In Café QR, the Every order export under Reports lists each order with its time, so you can count orders in each 15-minute slot of the peak in a spreadsheet.
The short version
Most lunch rushes are held up by ordering, not making. Moving ordering onto customers' phones, at the table and at the counter, is often cheaper than another pair of hands for two hours a day. If the till itself is the slow part, it is worth looking at how many taps a typical order takes on yours; our checklist for choosing a café POS covers what to test. See the café POS and QR table ordering pages for how Café QR handles both, or start with a free first month.