There’s an old saying that “necessity is the mother of invention.” Loman.ai’s cutting edge voice AI for restaurants is living proof. As Loman founder and CEO Christian Wiens explains, “Forty percent of restaurant calls are either put on hold or completely unanswered. That leads to over $20 billion in waste every year just from missed revenue.”
This missed revenue is what inspired Wiens and his partners to launch a state-of-the-art AI phone agent for restaurants in 2024. Today, Loman.ai serves hundreds of restaurants in the U.S. and beyond. But some owners are still hesitant to implement an AI phone agent in their restaurant, because they're worried an automated answering service may alienate customers.
However, Loman.ai makes it possible to benefit from voice AI for restaurants while still keeping that distinctly human touch in your operation. We caught up with Wiens to find out how.
What Is Voice AI for Restaurants?
First, let’s start with a basic overview of voice AI for restaurants. AI phone agent services are basically virtual receptionists. Voice AI will answer your phone calls just like a human would, except AI agents are available 24/7.
When your customers call, an AI phone agent responds with a human-like understanding and tone. But just how human are these interactions really?
With Loman.ai, Wiens says, “nearly 35% of people have no idea they're not speaking to a human.”
What Exactly Can an AI Phone Agent Do for Your Restaurant?
An AI phone agent can do everything a human can do, but faster, more accurately, and without rest. Wiens explains that it “answers phones, takes orders, and pushes them to the point of sale. It answers questions. It takes reservations. And we integrate with the top 10 POS [point of sale] systems on the market.”
That means your restaurant gets a 24/7 answering service that can actually handle, respond to, and process customer requests and inquiries without any added labor costs. But the benefits of an AI phone agent are bigger than reduced labor costs.
In reality, AI phone agents can fill gaps in labor and efficiency in ways that human beings simply can’t. This is why Wiens predicts that “in the next five years, AI phone agents are going to be everywhere and you will be left behind if you still have a human answering the phone.”
Why More Restaurants Are Turning to AI Phone Agents
Wiens is not speaking strictly as a tech guy. He speaks from a lifetime of experience in the restaurant industry. He was in sixth grade when he got his first restaurant gig, working alongside his older sister in an extremely busy Southern California BBQ joint so he could buy his first surfboard.
As he grew up, he worked every role you could in a restaurant — both front- and back-of-house. He remembers that “it was a beach town in the summer, so it would be incredibly busy. There'd be a line out the door. The phone would be ringing off the hook.”
Some days, he admits, they would just take the phone off the hook and put it on the counter to get it to stop ringing. Wiens estimates that it was costing the business hundreds of thousands of dollars a year.
The Challenge of Hiring Humans To Answer Phones
As Wiens’s experience shows, AI phone agents aren’t necessarily replacing human beings. They have the potential to handle roles that human beings in many restaurants don’t have the bandwidth for.
“It's way harder for operators to find help,” says Wiens. “COVID really changed the industry — finding good people to hire and work the front-of-house is nearly impossible. I hear this every single day from operators. Add that to the fact that minimum wage is rising to as much as $20 per hour in certain states. How do you expect some restaurant owners to keep up?”
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An effective AI phone agent can offset this challenge, especially for quick service businesses that may be fielding upwards of 100 calls a day.
“Anybody that does a lot of phone volume,” says Wiens, “we're going to be able to help tremendously. We are going to take 100% of your calls. We can answer multiple calls at once. We never put a customer on hold. We're always nice. Our agents never call in sick.”
How AI Phone Agents Help Human Workers
It’s easy to see how an AI phone agent can help make your restaurant run more efficiently. And Wiens acknowledges that some clients do use AI phone agents to cut down on labor costs. However, he says, “a lot of them keep the labor hours the same, and they still see an over 25% increase in phone order revenue because we're answering every single call and upselling every single time.”
In these instances, Wiens says, “we're not replacing jobs. We're making the restaurant run better. We're making them more money, and we're keeping those people employed.”
The result is actually a better and more engaged dining experience for customers. As Wiens points out, this redistribution of tasks “allows the people that are working in the restaurant to provide a better experience to the diners that are in there.”
How AI Phone Agents Can Actually Enhance the Service Experience
Wiens points out that the current generation of AI phone agents is leaps and bounds ahead of what customers are used to. Quick Service Restaurants (QSR) have always struggled to manage calls.
“But in the past,” Wiens says, “restaurants were trying to solve this problem with things like Interactive Voice Response [IVR]. Press 1 for this; press 2 for that. People hate that stuff, and it just doesn't work.”
This type of automated answering service feels impersonal. It can be alienating. And it leads to lost business. But an AI phone agent “remembers your name and remembers your order from last time. It automatically remembers your payment method and knows what your dining preferences are, and it can answer any questions you have about the menu.”
Adding an AI Phone Agent in Your Restaurant
Wiens points out that the technology behind AI phone agents is improving rapidly. He anticipates that the next year will bring exciting advancements in the capabilities of AI voice answering services, as well as their ability to simulate human interactions.
Remarkably, even as this technology becomes more sophisticated, it is also becoming more accessible. Wiens says that Loman.ai can have a customized, fully trained, and personally branded AI phone agent up and running in your restaurant in under 48 hours.
“As long as you have a point of sale system that we integrate with,” says Wiens, “we can get you going literally right away.”
Still have questions about how to implement an AI phone agent in your restaurant without losing the human touch? Reach out to our expert consultants with all of your questions and concerns.
