Fat Barbies

Highlights for Fat Barbies and Deliverect Partnership Story — TLDR

1. Pandemic-Driven Shift to Delivery: Fat Barbies, initially focused on its in-house dining experience, pivoted to delivery during the pandemic, which now accounts for 20-25% of its sales.

2. Operational Efficiency with Deliverect: The introduction of Deliverect transformed Fat Barbies’ delivery operations, moving from manual order entry to automated, unified management across multiple platforms.

3. Sales Strategy Insights from Data Analytics: Deliverect’s dashboards provided valuable insights into menu performance, aiding in developing more effective sales strategies and menu optimization.

4. Menu Management Made Easy: Managing menus across various delivery platforms became significantly more efficient with Deliverect, saving time and reducing the likelihood of errors in menu updates.

5. Endorsement of Deliverect as a Key Tool: Juancho Martini, partner of Fat Barbies, highly recommends Deliverect for its crucial role in streamlining delivery processes and considers it an essential investment for restaurants operating in the delivery space.

Juancho Martini is a Venezuelan chef and partner of Fat Barbies, a Barcelona restaurant serving organic, ecological, grilled, and smoked food. Little has happened since this place opened its doors in 2018, but much has rained, and many things have changed. One thing remains the same: Martini is clear about what to offer its customers. “In 2018, we opened Fat Barbies with a concept: fire, smoke, artisanal cuisine. Local products, organic meat, and an artisanal method of smoking and grilling, i.e., local firewood.”

He is also clear about how to offer his products: “We are involved in the whole process. We do everything ourselves, and we control the products and the process. Close, honest, casual service. An intimate, rustic place, this is our aesthetic concept. We have tried to evoke the feeling of a cabin, of that intimacy. The materials we use are wood, iron... all very primary, very tenuous”, concludes the Venezuelan.

The delivery challenge

However, sometimes, in the restaurant business, it is not enough to have an excellent product to be successful, and this is the case for Fat Barbies and other businesses that had to face pandemic conditions when the company was taking off. In this context of the early 2020s, most businesses closed, but Fat Barbies sought a solution so as not to have to pull the shutters down for too long: “It wasn’t an option for us to just close. We closed for a week, which translated into when we opened, and there were very few restaurants open in Barcelona, and it was crazy. We thought, what do we do with this reality? You have a payroll, a team, payments, debts... at that moment, what you could do was delivery”.

Said and done, Fat Barbies began to offer its products at home through different platforms. But this was not a bed of roses, and a change of such magnitude in a business can only require adjustments to get back on track: “We started in Fat Barbies Bailén. We had it open, we sold X, and after the pandemic, we sold 10 times more. A week before the pandemic, we started working with delivery. Somehow, we had a very viable product for delivery, such as a hamburger and a sandwich. We adapted and expanded the proposal we had for delivery.

"Today, delivery accounts for between 20% and 25% of our sales."

Deliverect, a vital tool for Fat Barbies

Martini knows why Deliverect was vital on the road to a delivery that works and that saved the business amid a pandemic: “It was total operational chaos. But with Deliverect, we improved management. We went from entering the order manually to unifying all the changes of a letter in all the platforms. At the time, there were 6 platforms. Deliverect does it automatically. This saves time and avoids errors.

In addition to highlighting Deliverect’s role in unifying communication with delivery companies, the Fat Barbies partner also emphasizes other aspects of the tool, such as Deliverect’s dashboards: “The graph is essential to see which items are the most satisfying, which ones you sell and which ones you don’t. This is useful for creating more suitable and profitable dishes and menus for sales strategies. This is very useful for sales strategies, to create more suitable and profitable dishes and menus”.

"Deliverect unifies and moves to the point of sale. All tickets go out to the kitchen, this is key."

Managing the menus on the different platforms through Deliverect has also been fundamental for this restaurant of grilled dishes. “It was a struggle, the time it takes one person to write everything down, change descriptions, prices... that’s money you stop charging. That multiplied by 5 platforms.”

Tools like Deliverect are an investment.

Martini is aware that tools like Deliverect are essential to improve sales and business: “Restaurants have tight margins, especially in delivery. Every euro counts, but delivery tools are an investment”. He is right.

Although Fat Barbies is once again offering his dishes in his establishment, and delivery accounts for approximately 20% to 25% of his total turnover today, he has no doubts in recommending the tool that helped him to get his business afloat in the middle of the pandemic: “I’m happy and satisfied. I would recommend Deliverect to any restaurant that works with delivery. I haven’t felt the need to look for competition”. After all, as he says, “Deliverect was an imperative need, at a time when delivery was our only sales channel; today it is still fundamental for our restaurant.” That’s what Deliverect is there for: to solve its customers’ problems.