Kentucky Fried Chicken launched a mobile wallet earlier this year in Britain and has seen positive results, including better customer service, mobile experience and relationship management.

KFC UK and Ireland partnered with Airtag to create KFC Fast Track to roll out the solution to ten restaurants across Britain. The mobile and Web application has proven to cut down ordering and waiting time as well as in-store lines by 60-70 percent.

“Users benefit from a better ordering experience because they can order and pay from anytime in just a few clicks, store their ordering history, payment details, favorite stores and favorite orders to make placing succeeding orders even faster,” said  Jeremie Leroyer, CEO of Airtag, New York.

“When the customer arrives in the physical store to pick-up an order, the order is prepared in priority and the user gets to skip the line, so there are no long lines or long waits in-store,” he said. “This creates more fluidity through-out the entire customer journey.”

KFC Fast Track
Through KFC‘s international Fast Track app, consumers can place an order anytime and anywhere.

Once they check-in to a restaurant through the app, they can skip the line to pick up their order from the Express Check-out.

If consumers are already in-store, they can swipe a QR code to avoid waiting in line to place the order as well.

Consumers can also use the app to locate the closest KFC restaurant and find details such as opening hours and menu items.

Additionally, the app can store ordering history, favorites and payment details so that consumers can place an order and pay with one click. The app also stores receipts.

Another benefit of KFC Fast Track is that the restaurants can manage the service in real-time and update product availability for specific restaurants.

Mobile results
KFC began working on this mobile solution in April to make it easier for busy consumers to order food (see story).

One of the key findings of the pilot run was that 90 percent of Fast Track users place orders via mobile.

According to Airtag, this may be the case since consumers are increasingly making ordering decisions on the fly, so ordering via mobile provides them with a faster method of ordering.

Another interesting result was that more than a third of the users were 18-29 years old. One of the goals of the Fast Track launch was to reach the tech savvy generation of mobile shoppers, so this data shows that KFC was able to better meed the needs of this age group.

“Consumers increasingly live their lives on the go from their smartphones,” said Mr. Leroyer. “To keep up with the mobile generation, quick-serve restaurants need to follow suit and deliver their end users, real-time, on demand, anytime and anywhere services.

“Additionally, mobile wallet solutions are a new and innovative way for QSRs to address ongoing in-store problems, like long line and waits, while at the same time creating a new channel for building relationships with customers,” he said.

“Through the mobile wallet, QSRs can start to gain better control over the customer experience.”

Final Take
Rebecca Borison is editorial assistant on Mobile Commerce Daily, New York