Meal Deal Design Best Practice

A frequent mistake occurs when designing meal deals by creating separate sections for each component without including the primary significant product.

Incorrect Approach Example

Quarter Pounder Burger Meal

• Choose your Burger Toppings:

  • Lettuce

  • Tomato

  • Cheese

• Choose your Burger Sauce:

  • Ketchup

  • Mayo

  • BBQ Sauce

• Choose your Chips:

  • Regular Chips

  • Large Chips

• Choose your Drink:

  • Coca-Cola

  • Sprite

  • Fanta

In POS

While it would allow you to choose the sauce and the toppings, the actual burger is missing.

In KDS

Since the burger is missing from the order, it will not show up in the KDS.

The Problem

When a customer selects BBQ, Cheese, Lettuce, Regular Chips, and Fanta the kitchen screens display:

• BBQ

• Cheese

• Lettuce

• Regular Chips

• Fanta

Missing: The actual Quarter Pounder Burger that the toppings belong to. And because the significant product is missing, kitchen staff only see toppings but don't know what to put them on.

Routing Issue: More often than not, these toppings are not even assigned to a specific station. Therefore, these toppings won't show at any kitchen screen.

The Solution

To properly configure meal deals, you must include the significant product within the meal. We need to set it as a default product (i.e., set the default quantity value of 1 or however many of that product is in the meal deal).

Correct Approach Example

Quarter Pounder Burger Meal

• Choose your Burger:

  • Quarter Pounder Burger (default quantity is 1)

• Choose your Chips:

  • Regular Chips

  • Large Chips

• Choose your Drink:

  • Coca-Cola

  • Sprite

  • Fanta

Ensure that the Quarter Pounder Burger exists as a standalone product, with all its customisation options configured. The meal will automatically pull the customisations of the product.

You can use a pre-existing Burgers customisation and set the default quantity and limit of the Quarter Pounder Burger to 1. Hide the other products if necessary.

In POS

Now that we've added the Quarter Pounder Burger and set it as the default and only available product, it will be shown as part of the meal deal.

The customisations within the product carry over, allowing us to still make modifications to it.

In KDS

The burger will then be routed to its assigned station, showing in KDS.