Top 8 Catering Management Software Solutions in 2022

After a couple of years full of cancellations and postponements, people around the world are finally able to organize weddings, celebrations, conferences, and various other in-person events.

While this return to normality is bound to benefit them, catering businesses are under more pressure than ever to maximize their workforce and time management, while staying on top of all administrative tasks.

As a catering business owner, you need to find ways to tackle employee turnover, reduce labor costs and operate more efficiently. 

A catering management software could be the difference between a business sinking and thriving in a time when there are more events than ever before.

In order to make an educated decision when it comes to implementing the right software for your business, let’s focus on some of the best catering apps that the industry has to offer.

Our Top Picks

1. Connecteam – Best all-in-one catering management software

2. Tripleseat – Good for restaurants

3. Foodstorm – Good for online ordering

What to Look for in Catering Management Software

When choosing catering management software, you should consider if it includes the following features and capabilities:

• Employee scheduling: The ability to create and share schedules with your workforce, assign shifts to individuals and grant workers control over them.
• Task management: Easily create tasks and assign to employees, including to-do lists and one-off tasks, with timely reminders and the ability to internally communicate regarding tasks.
• Time management: Managers should be able to track their employees’ work hours, while employees should be able to clock in and out, preferably from their mobile devices.
• Booking management calendar: Sales and catering management software should include some kind of digital calendar to easily manage bookings, prevent double-bookings and schedule appointments/calls. Ideally, such a calendar should also be able to sync with other digital calendars such as Google calendar. 
• Report generation: The ability to create, generate and share any kind of report, including proposals, invoices, event details, checklists, and more.
• Customer relationship management (CRM): Features designed to help catering business owners organize and track customer and vendor information in real-time, while also providing all relevant employees with the same information.

With all of these capabilities in mind, we have compiled a list of the best catering management systems that will help you maximize your workforce.

Top 8 Catering Management Software Solutions in 2022

Connecteam is an award-winning catering business software that managers can use to get the most out of their workforce. Both its desktop and mobile user interfaces are simple and easy on the eye, simplifying all business-related processes.

This all-in-one employee management solution helps catering teams digitize their time tracking, employee scheduling, internal communication, and much more. With Connecteam, you can:

• Ensure that employees only clock in and out from the workplace, and not before their shift starts, with a geofence time clock. 
• Guarantee that work hours/wages are 100% accurate with digital timesheets. When ready, export them to your payroll software (such as Quickbooks Online) in a couple of clicks. 
• Always know when employees are available, allow them to trade shifts, and assign shift tasks with effective employee scheduling. Every shift includes the exact roles required, including shift managers, bartenders, kitchen staff, and cleaners.
• Easily create any task and track their progress with task management capabilities.
• Create any kind of report (proposals, invoices, and safety checks) with digital forms and checklists.
• Simplify cross-business communication, and replace private apps and text messages with an in-app employee team chat.
• Effectively onboard every employee with personalized employee training courses, providing all relevant policies and preparing workers for any kind of event.
• Build a comprehensive knowledge center that includes all catering dishes, menu items, how tables and food should be set, etc.

Connecteam isn’t exclusively a catering management software, meaning that it currently doesn’t include some typical capabilities that are associated with a catering app (CRM, and booking management, etc). However, when it comes to employee management, Connecteam’s all-in-one capabilities are absolutely essential.

Key Features

• Employee scheduling based on roles

• GPS and geofence time clock

• 1:1 and team chat

• Knowledge center

• Quick task delegation

• Checklists, reports & forms

Pros and Cons

• All-in-one solution

• Super easy to use, no training needed

• Completely Scalable

• Amazing, quick-to-respond customer support

• Lacks some catering management features

Pricing

• Starts at just $29/month for up to 30 users

• Unlimited free plan for up to 10 users

• Free 14-day trial

Tripleseat is a cloud-based catering management system that is designed for restaurants and other hospitality industries. The system helps your business to respond to leads, communicate with guests, track event details, take payments, and more. Tripleseat ensures everyone, from the event manager to the head chef, is on the same page.

Key Features

• Centralized bookings calendar

• Branded documents and proposals

• PCI compliant online credit card processing

• Offline payment tracking with your POS

• Automatic payment reminders and alerts

• eSignatures

Pros and Cons

• Great customer service

• Easy to use

• Some features are a little complicated

Pricing

• Contact a representative to learn more about pricing

Whether your business deals with online ordering, retail catering, onsite catering, event catering, or corporate catering, FoodStorm allows you to automate processes, generate more sales, and satisfy your customers. Depending on your catering needs, the features may vary.

Key Features

• CRM features

• Online ordering

• Order tracking

• Reporting

• Payment and invoicing

Pros and Cons

• Nice interface

• Mobile phone compatibility is limited

Pricing

• Licensing starts at $500/month, a one-time implementation fee & an ongoing monthly subscription fee

Better Cater is great for restaurants, large-scale food reparation, function and event caterers, corporate catering, food trucks, and onsite catering. This catering business software prides itself on offering you one solution to manage events, create automatic packing lists, and generate reports.

Key Features

• Professional-looking proposals

• Simple & customizable reports

• Intuitive scheduling

• CRM database

• An integrated calendar that syncs with Google Calendar, Outlook, and Apple Calendar

Pros and Cons

• Easy to use

• No mobile app at the moment

• Not many features

Pricing

• $69/month with additional users costing $30/month

• Free catering software 30-day trial

Priava is an award-winning catering business software for venues and events. Priava is designed to assist teams with the management of catering orders, CRM, sales and marketing, quoting, equipment hire and tracking, resource requirements, and business intelligence.

There are also add-on options available, for example, catering, inventory, online bookings, ticketing, advanced permissions, packages, and more. 

Key Features

• Opportunities and quotes

• Task management

• Reporting

• Email functionality

• Cloud-based file storage

• GDPR compliance

Pros and Cons

• Great customer management and support

• Hard to understand how to use some features

Pricing

• Speak with a representative about pricing

Curate considers itself a modern and intuitive catering management system. This software allows you to automate processes so it’s easier to grow your company.

Key Features

• Turn digital forms into proposals

• Keep track of customers and vendors

• Project accurate prices based on recipe costs

• Send orders off to the supplier of your choice

• Inventory tracking

• Overbooking notifications

Pros and Cons

• Top notch customer support

• Some features are glitchy

• Can be complicated to use

Pricing

• Starts at $1500 per year.

With Caterease, you can easily manage every single aspect of your catered orders and events. As a manager, you can track your business through flexible reports and customizable queries. In addition, you may use customizable wizard tools and create custom prints to reflect your brand image.

A mobile app is available as well.

Key Features

• Wizard driven event booking

• Drag and drop menu management

• Equipment inventory

• Automatic packing lists

• Site location management

• Cost and profit management 

Pros and Cons

• Awesome customer support

• Not super user-friendly

Pricing

• The most popular plan costs $125/month + $200 setup (each user is $35/month)

Total Party Planner is a web-based management system that allows you to streamline your catering business to allow your creativity to translate into profitability. 

Key Features

• CRM

• Calendar reminders

• Task management

• Accurate food costing controls

Pros and Cons

• User-friendly

• Great customer support

• Lacking in some features

• Mobile app could be better

Pricing

• For just one user, you pay $65/month and additional users cost $25/month each

• Two users cost $165/month and additional users cost $25/month each

What Is Catering Management Software?

Catering management software is a digital solution that can help restaurants and food service companies better manage all of the organizational challenges that come with running a catering business.

There is a variety of catering software that differ in what they offer in terms of features, implementation, ease of use, and price. Generally, this kind of software is designed for catering, banquet management and event management industries.

How Does Catering Management Software Work? 

There are some common features and functionalities that are present in most catering management software solutions. For a start, these solutions usually allow managers to track employee hours, schedule events via an online calendar and send bills to customers. 

This kind of software also usually includes a main dashboard which managers can operate from their desktop. For, admins can build processes, like creating forms and checklists that they can allocate to both employees and customers.

A mobile catering app may also be available for employees to use on their end. Through this, they can claim and trade shifts, clock in and out and communicate with co-workers and managers, amongst other things.

The Benefits of Catering Management Software

Here are five ways that a catering management software can benefit your business:

• It saves time: Managing a catering business through manual processes can be awfully time-consuming. With catering management software, all processes become digitized or automated, making scheduling, time management and communication all much easier.
• It reduces business costs: Investing in catering management software can ultimately save your business money. It allows managers to keep track of every financial aspect of their business, receive accurate calculations, and identify areas of improvement.
• Can manage business operations from anywhere: Going mobile means that catering businesses can do everything from any location. This can include financial management, communication, scheduling, and more. All important information is stored in one place and accessible, wherever you may be working.
• Better customer experience: CRM capabilities that catering businesses can stay aware of customer’s specific requirements, food allergies, guest numbers, price details, etc.
• Boost employee communication: Without efficient communication, a catering business will suffer in virtually every other aspect of their operations. When employees can easily communicate from their mobile devices with each other and upper management, every question gets answered instantly and emergencies are handled in real-time, with no time wasted.

How Much Does Catering Management Software Cost? 

Catering management software usually varies in pricing depending on the features included and the number of users required.

The reality is that most catering management systems tend to veer on the pricier side of things. Take Better Cater, for example, which costs $69 per month, while each additional users costs an extra $30 per month. Either that, or the catering app in question doesn’t provide pricing information on their website. In which case, customers will need to contact sales representatives.

With this in mind, it’s worth considering a catering business software that provides the widest range of capabilities at the most affordable price. Connecteam’s all-in-one catering management software has a basic pricing plan of just $29 per month for the first 30 users. It’s also worth considering free catering software solutions too.

FAQs

1. Are apps for catering businesses expensive?

It depends on the catering business software that you choose to implement. No catering software is created equal. Some will charge heavily per user or per event. Others qualify as free catering software, but can only deliver limited features. So it really depends on what functionalities you need to operate your catering business successfully.

2. Do I also need a catering scheduling app?

Some catering software already includes a version of a catering scheduling app, like Connecteam for example. So if you need a separate catering app with scheduling capabilities – like to book appointments – you might want to look at what you really need to manage to schedule.

3. Are apps for catering businesses easy to use or implement?

This is similar to the pricing question, it depends on the catering software that you implement. Some may be affordable but hard to use. While others may give you the best of both worlds. If a certain free catering software is available, then sign up to test out how easy it is to use and implement. After all, you want to use it on a daily basis and you want your employees to do the same.

The Bottom Line On Catering Management Software

The list of the best catering software solutions above can help to eliminate common issues your catering business faces on a daily basis. While also streamlining day-to-day operations like efficient management, billing and invoicing, scheduling staff, tracking hours, venue management, in-depth reports, and more. Therefore, ensure you go through each of the catering software we listed so you can choose the best choice for your business.