Yahoo Finance culinary correspondent Brooke DiPalma joins the Live Show to discuss the partnership between Wendy's and Google to revolutionize drive-thru orders with the use of AI technology, first premiering in Columbus, Ohio in June of this year, and how AI is transforming the restaurant industry.
Video Transcript
SEANA SMITH: Wendy's is partnering with Google Cloud to bring AI to its drive throughs. Now, this is called Wendy's Fresh AI. The pilot kicks off in June in Columbus, Ohio area at a company operated restaurant. Brooke DiPalma is here with those details. Brooke, it sounds exciting.
BROOKE DIPALMA: Good afternoon. It certainly does sound exciting. Pretty interesting here. I'm eager to see how exactly it works, but as you noted this is one of the first partnerships that have come out of this collaboration between Google Cloud and Wendy's.
That partnership began in 2021. This is called Wendy's Fresh AI. The first pilot of Wendy's Fresh AI sets launch in June in Columbus, Ohio near its headquarters in Dublin, Ohio. Now, in addition to that, the company wants you to know that the AI technology has the ability to understand made to order requests, which they say includes billions of different combinations.
For example, if a customer asks for a large milkshake, this technology will know that they're asking for a frosty. In addition to that, they said that it'll be as natural as interacting with employees. Eager to see if customers think so as well. And in this pilot customers can expect a female voice. Now, what you also need to know is that Wendy's expects here to improve speed, accuracy, and consistency with this automated technology.
And based on this pilot, Wendy's is looking for a few key things in addition to that drive-through speed. The customer is also taking a closer look at order averages. They hope to see a boost in sales with upselling opportunities that the AI technology will offer like larger sizes, asking customers perhaps if they want a frosty with their orders, in addition to daily specials. And this comes as drive-through remains a key opportunity for Wendy's. About 75% to 80% of Wendy's customers prefer drive-thru now, Seana, that's a big jump compared to roughly 2/3 before the COVID 19 pandemic.
And Wendy's hoping to be not only a game changer here, but a leader in AI technology and the drive-thru.
SEANA SMITH: It certainly makes sense. It certainly seems like that with the recent moves there. When it comes to AI, we talk about how so many companies are talking about it on their earnings releases. It sounds like Wendy's isn't the only food company and not the only fast food chain that's incorporating AI. Who are some of the others?
BROOKE DIPALMA: Right, certainly not alone in that. In fact, this is probably the top, if not the topic of this earnings season. I mean, we heard McDonald's mention it in their earnings call, but in addition to that, they also teamed up with IBM back in 2021 to further accelerate and to development and deployment of their automated voice ordering technology. We've heard some customer feedback about the accuracy of it. A bit of a rough start there.
Wingstop in March partnered with AI voice startup Converse. Now they're running a pilot where they're using voice AI powered virtual assistants to take customers' phone orders at select locations. We're also seeing Yum Brands using recommended ordering to understand how much food is needed at restaurants.
And Chipotle using AI for kitchen management to streamline operations. They also introduced Chippy the robot and what they call an AI kitchen assistant to make chips. Chipotle's CFO also weighed in on the opportunity saying that it is taking a well thought out approach. Take a listen.
JACK HARTUNG: There's a lot of possibilities. There's also a lot of pitfalls as well. So we want to be very careful, very thoughtful. But, certainly, if there's ways we can make the job that our crews do, the jobs that our support staff do to support a restaurant easier and better and if the end result is we can run better restaurants and serve the customers in a better way, we're certainly going to look at any technology.
BROOKE DIPALMA: And, of course, this earnings season is not over yet. There's more food companies set to report later on this week, including Wendy's before the bell on Wednesday. We also have Cheesecake Factory after the bell on Wednesday in addition to Krispy Kreme Thursday before the bell. And so certainly something to look out for, something that we've heard not only from food chains, but also PepsiCo, Coca-Cola, looking to get into the mix here. And so something for investors and also Main Street to look out for.
Perhaps, you'll be ordering your drive-thru a little bit different in the near future.
SEANA SMITH: All right, Brooke. Exciting stuff. Thanks so much.
