About

PLNT Burger’s mission is to give customers the ability to ‘Eat the Change’ by crafting and redefining some of America’s favorite foods. Menu offerings include burgers, soft-serve, savory snacks, and seasonal salads all free from animal products. Started by Celebrity Chef and Restaurateur Spike Mendelsohn, the plant-based fast food concept opened its first location in Silver Spring, Maryland in 2019 and has since expanded to 12 locations across the National Capital Region, Pennsylvania, New York, and Massachusetts. 

Challenge

PLNT Burger was looking for ways to offload phone-based customer service responsibilities from its staff so they could focus their attention on providing customers in store with the best experience possible. PLNT Burger also wanted to streamline its takeout and delivery orders through its ordering website. 

Staff time spent on the phone taking orders and answering questions about where their stores are located did not fit into PLNT Burger’s operating model. Even though PLNT Burger did not want to staff someone full time to answer guests’ phone calls, it still wanted the phone to be a channel of communication for its guests. Since PLNT Burger knew there would always be guests who prefer to get their questions answered through the phone, they looked for an automated phone solution and found Slang.ai.

Solution

PLNT Burger trialed Slang.ai at three locations with 23 custom responses tailored to each restaurant location. Within two weeks of the first onboarding call with Slang.ai, all three locations went live with Slang.ai’s voice services, which included a custom virtual phone agent voice and background soundscape.

Store opening hours, addresses, and parking information were just a few of the call topics Slang.ai could help deflect for PLNT Burger’s staff. Most importantly, PLNT Burger could text its customers links to place takeout and delivery orders through its custom ordering website. During the first month, Slang.ai handled 245 calls and helped save the team 20 hours across PLNT Burger’s trial locations.

After 2 months of the initial trial, PLNT Burger decided to launch Slang.ai’s virtual assistant across all its locations and future locations to provide a consistent brand experience for diners. PLNT Burger plans on using Slang.ai exclusively to answer phone calls without any human intervention.

Results

1. 5X ROI from labor hours saved and increase in transaction volume.
2. Hundreds of labor hours saved per year.
3. 94% of surveyed callers say the automated experience was helpful to them.