OLO (online ordering)

OLO Online Ordering

Type	Private company
Industry	Internet, mobile, restaurants
Founded	New York City (June 2005)
Headquarters	New York City
Key people	Noah Herbert Glass, founder and chief executive officer
Website	www.olo.com

OLO is a mobile and online food ordering platform that allows customers to order food from online menus.

OLO was founded in 2005 by entrepreneur Noah Herbert Glass with the name "GoMobo" and was renamed "OLO" in 2010.^[1] The GoMobo service allows customers to order and pay ahead over the Internet or through a mobile phone, so that they can "Skip the Line" at quick-serve restaurants (QSR’s) and casual-dining restaurants (CDRs) across the United States.^[2] In 2009, New York Magazine referred to GoMobo as "Fandango for Food."^[3]

OLO major restaurant clients

OLO is a service provider to restaurants that want to add remote ordering capabilities to their existing restaurant websites. Current "powered by OLO" ordering microsites include:

• Boloco Online Ordering
• Cold Stone Cakes
• Dallas BBQ Online Ordering
• Five Guys Online Ordering
• Subway Now

Do-it-yourself online ordering

OLO also works with hundreds of independent restaurants,^[4] providing them with self-service management tools that make it easy to add remote ordering services to their existing restaurant websites. Using the OLO self-signup tool, restaurant owners and managers can sign up their restaurants online, manage store info, website design, online menus, and delivery settings, and pull chain-level, region-level, or store-level reports on sales, products, and users.^[5]

Peek Takeout Order Receiver

In early 2010, OLO launched a standalone hardware device, which allows restaurants who lack Internet access or an advanced point-of-sale system to make use of the OLO remote ordering platform.^[6] When customers place orders online or from their mobile phone, OLO transmits the orders to the restaurants’ device, which buzzes and sounds a siren to notify the restaurant crew that the order has arrived. The system uses Peek Pronto hardware device and service by Peek and launched with 100 restaurants in Southern California and Las Vegas^[7].

OLO mobile services

OLO was the first US online ordering company to release text-message-ordering capabilities in 2005.^[8] Today, GoMobo works with restaurants to create mobile applications for the Android, Blackberry, and iPhone.^[9] OLO also creates mobile-optimized mobile ordering websites, that allow customers to place orders with faster page load times and fewer clicks and keystrokes. Current "Powered by OLO" mobile ordering microsites include:

• Boloco To Go
• Five Guys Mobile Ordering
• Subway Now Mobile

OLO executives

• David Fellows, vice president, product development^[10]
• Noah Herbert Glass, founder and chief executive officer^[11]
• Andrew Murray, systems architect and vice president, engineering^[12]
• Evan Sanchez, vice president, client services^[13]

OLO investors

• Founder collective
• RRE Ventures
• Core capital partners

OLO board of directors

• David Frankel, Founder collective
• Noah Herbert Glass, founder
• Jim Robinson IV, managing partner, RRE Ventures
• Tom Wheeler, managing director, Core Capital Partners

OLO advisory board

• Terry Addington, CTIA former chairman
• Aubrey Balkind, Frankfurt-Balkind former CEO
• Greg Barton, Menupages.com founder
• Joe Cugine, PepsiCo Foodservice former chief customer officer
• Des Docherty, VISA Cross-product senior business leader
• Dr. Chris Howard, Hampden-Sydney College president
• Jim Melvin, intelligent transactions, LLC CEO

References

1. ^ David Muir (20 September 2006). "Texting Food Orders Makes Cutting In Line OK". ABC News. http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=2469643&page=1. 
2. ^ Alexander Wolfe (1 November 2007). "GoMobo Brings Fandango-Like Advance Ordering To Your Morning Coffee Run". Information Week. http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2007/11/gomobo_brings_f.html. 
3. ^ Emma Rosenblum (2 August 2009). "Line Cutter". New York Magazine. http://nymag.com/news/intelligencer/breaking/58181/. 
4. ^ "Will Text for Food". QSR Magazine. September 2009. http://restaurants.gomobo.com/pdf/qsrArticle9-09.pdf. 
5. ^ Angelo Fernando (March 2008). "Coming to a cell phone near you". Franchise Times. http://www.franchisetimes.com/content/story.php?article=00758. 
6. ^ Giselle Tsirulnik (26 February 2010). "Panda Express testing mobile ordering system to drive sales". Mobile Commerce Daily. http://www.mobilecommercedaily.com/panda-express-testing-mobile-ordering-system-to-drive-incremental-sales/. 
7. ^ "Panda Express To Be Equipped With Express Service". QSR Magazine. 26 February 2010. http://www.qsrmagazine.com/articles/news/story.phtml?id=10378. 
8. ^ "America's Best Young Entrepreneurs". BusinessWeek. 30 October 2006. http://images.businessweek.com/ss/06/10/bestunder25/source/9.htm. 
9. ^ Robin Hilmantel (March 2009). "GoMobo Brings an EZ Pass Lane to Quick-Serves". QSR Magazine. http://www.qsrmagazine.com/articles/exclusives/0309/GoMobo-1.phtml. 
10. ^ "David Fellows LinkedIn profile". http://www.linkedin.com/pub/david-fellows/5/885/a48. 
11. ^ "Noah Herbert Glass LinkedIn profile". http://www.linkedin.com/in/nhglass. 
12. ^ "Andrew Murray LinkedIn profile". http://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmurray. 
13. ^ "Evan Sanchez LinkedIn profile". http://www.linkedin.com/pub/evan-sanchez/3/945/229.