How Fry the Coop Serves 1.2M Guests a Year with Smart Tech

Fry the Coop Tech Stack

* Point of Sale: Toast

* Customer Feedback & Reviews: Ovation

* Scheduling & Team Communication: 7shifts

* Financial Management: NetSuite

* Delivery: Uber Eats, DoorDash, Grubhub (integrated with Toast)

* Music & Entertainment: Soundtrack (Spotify-owned), Roku TV

* Security: Alarm Detection Systems + Ubiquity Protect cameras

* Kitchen Tech: Solstice fryers + Armadillo filtering machine

* Team Collaboration: Slack

* Other Tools: iPhone (primary device), ChatGPT for menu pricing strategy

Toast as the Operational Backbone

Fontana calls Toast the “all-day, every-day” solution for Fry the Coop. The chain uses it for nearly everything:

* POS and handhelds at every location

* Kitchen display systems (KDS) replacing printed tickets

* Loyalty and email marketing

* Online ordering directly integrated

* Toast Now app for quick sales and labor snapshots

* Toast Sous Chef (AI in beta), which consolidates data and generates insights like top-selling items

The Toast ecosystem also powers third-party delivery. Orders from Uber Eats, DoorDash, and Grubhub flow directly into the POS for a seamless experience.

Managing Customer Feedback with Ovation

Like many fast-casual concepts, Fry the Coop deals with inevitable order mistakes. Ovation gives upset customers an outlet before they turn to Yelp or Google Reviews.

The results:

* Dramatic reduction in one-star reviews

* Spike in five-star reviews thanks to proactive text prompts

* Actionable feedback summaries powered by AI

“It helps us get better,” Fontana says.

Scheduling, Communication, and Culture

With nearly 200 employees, consistency is crucial. Fry the Coop uses 7shifts for scheduling and staff communication.

* Team members can view schedules on mobile.

* Managers push out announcements, SOPs, and even YouTube training videos.

* Integration with Toast keeps labor data in sync.

Fontana also credits Slack as a free but invaluable tool:

“If I email you, only you see it. If I Slack you, the whole team sees it. Game changer.”

The team is in the process of moving onto NetSuite for deeper financial management—Fontana calls it “getting our big boy pants on.”

Entertainment, Security, and Atmosphere

* Music: Fry the Coop uses Soundtrack, owned by Spotify, to manage playlists across locations.

* TVs: Cutting the cord saved $15K annually by switching from DirecTV to Roku.

* Security: Local alarms plus Ubiquity cameras allow near real-time monitoring, which proved crucial during a recent break-in.

Kitchen & Frying Tech

Fry the Coop’s fryers are Pitco Solstice models, powered by beef tallow frying that’s gained viral attention. For filtration, Fontana swears by the Armadillo filtering machine from All Solutions Group:

* Works better than built-in fryer filters

* Reliable for handmade, non-frozen food prep

* Family-run company with overnight part replacements

AI in the Operator’s Toolkit

Fontana says he also leans on ChatGPT for restaurant consulting-style insights—like pricing chicken sandwiches during rising commodity costs.

“It gave me a snapshot I’d pay $10,000 for from a consultant,” he said.

Final Word

From loyalty-driven POS and feedback systems to fryer filtration and Slack messaging, Fry the Coop’s tech stack reflects the reality of modern multi-unit operations: the right mix of efficiency, customer experience, and scalability.

As Fontana puts it: “The more we can learn about what people are using, it helps us. A