Pantry: An Edinburgh brunch destination for 10 years

Over the past 10 years, Stef and her team have built up Pantry as a destination in Edinburgh. She’s proud not only to host the customers who love Pantry, but also her team’s happiness. “It always comes back to the food we serve, but also the people,” she explains. “The atmosphere that we create, and the fact that people are always happy and coming back to us.”

“If you're doing something well, you want to carry on doing it well,” she says of Pantry’s success so far. “But for us, it's also about growing sustainably, and making sure that whatever we're doing, it’s authentic. I need to make sure everyone on the team understands the core of what we do.”

Lightspeed has been a big part of Pantry’s growth, and Stef chose it based on word of mouth. “It was trying to find a system that would work for us, and there are so many systems out there,” she explains. “So I spoke to other businesses around Edinburgh and asked them what they were using. Lightspeed came up and we were very impressed with the reports and the back office, but also the way it looked on an iPad for our team to put an order through, and how fast it could be.”

Stef was looking for a system that was not only fast, but super tailored to the needs of a business like hers. “I needed those very obscure reports that only a hospitality person would want,” she says.

Stef and her team use Lightspeed’s reporting feature to see their hourly numbers, and it’s helped them get even better at what they do. “It has improved our processes so much because, when you're trying to be very cost effective with staffing, for example, we know when to put people in while making sure customers are being attended to.”

Stef says she appreciates the clarity the reports bring to her day-to-day, as well, helping her see beyond her own intuition. “I could be there every morning on a weekday and then maybe have a day off and think, we need to open earlier,” she describes. “But then you go to the numbers and you check, and the numbers tell you otherwise.”

“The reports really give us comfort and confidence in making decisions that are so hard for a small business, because you are on your own,” Stef says. She says those small, daily decisions can really impact her profitability and revenue, and she needs that confidence boost while she’s making choices.

She also appreciates the confidence Lightspeed gives her when it comes to understanding her team’s success. “I can look at when that person was working and if they pushed a special dish or drink, for example,” she explains. “And you can see that person is really doing well, and you can recognise them. It’s things that you would never think of, and it makes a lot of time consuming things easier.”