Founder POV: Ordering in hospitality is widely perceived as a chore: you order the veg, raise the PO, tick, tick boom.

This article is adapted from a LinkedIn post by Robbie Francis, Founder of Hops.

Ordering in hospitality is widely perceived as a chore: you order the veg, raise the PO, tick, tick boom.

But in actuality, ordering is infrastructure. And most businesses are running that infrastructure through chaos.

Let’s look at a typical supplier estate:

• The bespoke mushroom guy? → WhatsApp.
• The big national wholesaler? → Log into their portal.
• Another supplier? → “Just email it” or “Use the app”

Across your supplier base, you’re constantly adapting to their systems.

Now here’s the rule: If it comes through the back door, it better have a digital signature.

Because if it DOESN’T exist digitally, it doesn’t exist in your cost of sale……..and that’s where margin leakage lives.

Ordering is the first link in a long operational chain, and if that first link is fragmented, everything downstream suffers.

If a chef:

• Places an order outside the system
• Forgets to log it
• Makes a 3am emergency phone order

That “small” shortcute becomes: → A delivery discrepancy → A stock variance → A recipe costing issue

Incurring vast amounts of technical debt and financial headaches down the line. It’s like building a house on a cracked foundation. It may not matter right this moment, but you can bet it will eventually!!!

When you place orders through Hops, 2 important things happen:

1️⃣ You create a single source of truth

You can see:

• What’s been ordered
• What’s expected, what’s arrived
• What’s outstanding

Every cost is captured at source.

2️⃣ The system removes friction (so people actually use it)

Operators are busy…….. If you make ordering cumbersome, they will bypass it.

So Hops makes ordering available:

• On web
• On mobile
• Even embedded directly inside POS

Capture procurement at source, reduce fragmentation, remove friction and protect the cost of sale.

Next time, we’re gonna take a look at the difference between Supplier POs and shopping lists.

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About Robbie Francis
Robbie Francis is the Founder of Hops. He has spent years building and implementing hospitality technology with operators, focused on simplifying back-of-house operations across inventory and finance.

Follow Robbie on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/robbiefrancis

View the original LinkedIn post: Ordering in hospitality is widely perceived as a chore: you order the veg, raise the PO, tick, tick boom.