IRIS, the global provider of mobile F&B and guest experience platforms for the hospitality sector, today announced the renewal of its 10-year, exclusive digital F&B ordering agreement with Marriott International, the world’s largest travel company with 8,700 properties. The announcement comes as IRIS deploys mobile dining in thousands of outlets across Marriotts hotels.
Under this renewed agreement, Marriott will continue to utilize IRIS’s seamless and efficient mobile dining and digital guest directory solution to maximise F&B revenue, free up staff time and enhance the guest experience across their global portfolio of hotels.
Since first partnering with Marriott International 10 years ago, the group has seen a double digit increase in the volume of guest mobile orders and revenue, and this looks set to rise further in line with the growth in guest demand for digital experiences.
The collaboration sees IRIS (also available via QR codes and web links) operating across Marriott’s portfolio of 30 luxury, premium, and select service brands.
IRIS has extended its tech eco-system with integrations to third party POS and payment vendors that Marriott works with including Oracle Simphony Cloud, Toast POS, Infrasys, InfoGenesis, Stripe, and FreedomPay, further increasing efficiencies for operators. Marriott has also developed brand-approved content (such as menu and company information) and marketing material for the hotels to simplify operations, enhance deployment and maintain a consistent identity across all brands.
The ease of use and popularity of the app has contributed significantly to the 87% year-on-year increase in order volumes and 94% increase in F&B revenue. This trend underscores the seamless nature of digital ordering and the enthusiastic adoption by hotel guests.
“We’re delighted with the efficiency of the app and how seamlessly it enables us to manage and process a large volume of room service and corporate orders.”
Graham Rushin, VP Sales and Marketing at IRIS, added, “The rise in guest demand for mobile ordering and self-service options is unquestionable and only looks set to continue. Indeed, average checks from digital orders are on average 20-30% higher compared to traditional orders.
“We’re delighted to extend our partnership with Marriott as the only approved vendor for digital F&B ordering and work closely with the Digital Guest Services team to scale up mobile dining and digital guest directories for their brands and properties.
“We pride ourselves on investing and developing robust solutions that equip operators with the tools they need to increase guest spend in line with the growing mobile-first trend, streamline operations and enrich the guest service.”
In the last 12 months IRIS has invested in the research and development of a host of new features for its F&B online ordering solution. These include a new search and filter function for allergens, split bill feature to make group bill settlements easier and a call wait staff function to enable operators to provide swifter waiter service to those guests that request it. Each one enables hospitality operators to realise their operational and revenue potential at a time when inflation and recruitment continue to present challenges.
The new agreement will also include IRIS’ latest feature – digital staff ordering -which enables waitstaff to use IRIS on any device to take orders from customers. Providing quick and efficient ordering for those guests that prefer waiter service, it helps reduce customers wait times and free up staff time.