Future of Work News Free eNews Subscription

AI at the Drive-Thru: Wendy's and Google Cloud are Piloting FreshAI to Assist Customers

By

When I woke up this morning and cracked into today’s articles, I hadn’t considered the possibility of writing about Wendy’s.

(Little did I know, as it turns out.)

Though non-Wendy’s restaurants (e.g. Missouri’s Red’s Giant Hamburg and California’s In-N-Out Burger) are recognized as having established drive-thru service, Wendy’s has also gotten its share of credit for popularizing it. (And speaking of popular – besides the meal options millions of folks enjoy – I don’t know if you, readers, have ever seen the official Wendy’s Twitter account but whoever is in charge of running it is often quite hilarious.)

I digress; back to the news. In terms of drive-thru experiences, Wendy’s is looking to do more than just “stay hip with the times” and, instead, is full-on innovating alongside Google Cloud. The two companies recently announced an expansion to their ongoing partnership via the piloting of a new AI solution.

Yes, even Wendy’s is hopping aboard the AI hype train.

It’s called Wendy’s FreshAI. (Appropriate, given the Wendy’s “Fresh, Never Frozen Beef Since 1969” tagline.

Wendy’s FreshAI is, according to Wendy’s, “designed to revolutionize the quick service restaurant industry.” This AI has the potential to further modernize (I say “further” due to active drive-thru upgrades like digital screens, new ordering systems, etc.) the drive-thru ordering experiences with Google Cloud’s generative AI and large language model technology.

This June, Wendy’s plans to launch the first pilot of FreshAI in a Columbus, Ohio, area. There, feedback on FreshAI will be aggregated and later used to improve this smart drive-thru process.

As drivers pull up to this particular drive-thru, an automated voice will converse with them. It will ask questions when necessary, generate responses to FAQs and readily understand made-to-order requests before the drivers pull up to the window to pay and snag their bounties of food. Or perhaps just one Frosty; hard to go wrong there.

Per Todd Penegor, Wendy’s CEO, “Wendy's introduced its first modern pick-up window more than 50 years ago. Today, we're thrilled to continue our work with Google Cloud to bring a new wave of innovation to our drive-thru experiences. Google Cloud's strides in generative AI technologies have created a huge opportunity to deliver differentiated, faster and frictionless experiences, specifically from us to our customers. With FreshAI, our employees can continue focusing on making great food and building relationships that keep people coming back time and again.”

We’ll see how FreshAI fares, given a number of additional factors. Such include the AI handling seasonal menu items being requested (rather than just evergreen items), as well as “off menu” requests, dietary restrictions being processed, ambient noise being a possible disruption (i.e. in a city-esque environment, not just a quieter suburban one), general conversation guardrails that leave little-to-no room for incorrect processing of customer orders, the AI providing menu misinformation, and more to uphold “Wendy’s exceptional service of fast, fresh-made food.”




Edited by Greg Tavarez
Get stories like this delivered straight to your inbox. [Free eNews Subscription]

Future of Work Contributor

SHARE THIS ARTICLE

Related Articles

New AI-Enhanced Customer Experience and Relationship Solution by Genesys and Salesforce

By: Greg Tavarez    9/28/2023

Using CX Cloud from Genesys and Salesforce allows companies to enhance customer personalization while relieving the IT and analyst teams of developmen…

READ MORE

MiaRec Enhances Conversational Intelligence with Generative AI

By: Stefania Viscusi    9/28/2023

MiaRec's Auto QA empowers businesses to extract maximum value from their customer interactions.

READ MORE

Hybrid or In-Person Work Over the Next Decade? New Data Points to the Former

By: Alex Passett    9/28/2023

A new Future of Work study from Omdia concludes that, while working in person has its value, a vast percentage of companies' employees favor hybridity…

READ MORE

Infosys and NVIDIA Expand Partnership for 'AI First' Offerings

By: Tracey E. Schelmetic    9/27/2023

Digital services and consulting company Infosys recently announced a partnership with NVIDIA.

READ MORE

Egnyte and Microsoft Reinforce Commitment to Hybrid Work with Collaboration Upgrades

By: Greg Tavarez    9/27/2023

Egnyte strengthened its relationship with Microsoft to provide customers with additional real-time document collaboration and sharing features through…

READ MORE