The growth was partly due to faster response in its catering hotline service. Ng said the traditional PBX system required extra charges for additional hotlines to cope with the festive season. The company also needed to rely on the service provider to set up the system. The IP-based system allows Fairwood to set up a catering hotline easily and to retain customers from reducing missed calls, he said.

Making products available

Another basic retail customer need is to have products in stock. Making products available and keeping them fresh is challenging for fast food chains like Fairwood, where menus change frequently and customer demand for products varies.

"To make an accurate forecast on the consumption of perishable products in order to keep our food supply available [while also maintaining] a minimal inventory level is one big challenge for us," said Tse.

He noted Fairwood manages its inventory control and purchase orders based on menus. Monitoring of the inventory is based the number of meals sold and purchase orders are made according to menu plans, as well as predictions on the number of meals to be sold.