Restaurant Jobs Are Coming To An End As More Restaurant Chains Are Investing In Robots To Replace Real Workers

This year was “the year of the robot,” CNBC declared, explaining that more restaurant chains and franchises are slowly phasing out physical workers with robots, though investors continue to say the robots are only meant to make the job easier.

This year brought a flurry of automation announcements in the restaurant industry as operators scrambled to find solutions to a shrinking workforce and climbing wages. But the efforts have been spotty so far, and experts say it will be years before robots pay off for companies or take the place of workers.

Automation startups pitch themselves as a solution. They say that robots can flip burgers and assemble pizzas more consistently than overworked employees, and that artificial intelligence can enable computers to take drive-thru orders more accurately.

CNBC wrote

Since workers are in short and inconstant supply these days, and many employees want wages to increase higher than minimum wage, chains are looking to integrate robots in the workplace to fill the void.

CNBC focused on Miso Robotics who made many automation announcements this year. One of their inventions is “Flippy,” a robot that can autonomously flip burgers and make chicken wings, and is already being integrated in some White Castle locations for roughly $3,000 a month.

Buffalo Wild Wings has also been trialing Flippy as well to fry chicken wings.

Meanwhile other places like Chipotle have begun trialing a robot called “Chippy” that makes the nacho chips instead of using manual labor.

SEE: Chipotle Releases New RFID Packaging For Improved Traceability

Other such examples include Picnic Works, which ‘offers pizza assembly equipment that automates adding sauce, cheese and other toppings. A Domino’s franchisee is testing the technology at a Berlin location,’ CNBC explained. CEO Clayton Wood told CNBC that rental costs are around $3,250 a month.

In the company’s demonstration video, the company says “you can save time, money, and labor with the Picnic Pizza Station.”

Panera Bread has also experimented with artificial intelligence software that can take drive-thru orders, along with another system provided by Miso that checks the volume and temperatures of the coffee to improve its quality. The Senior Editor for Nation’s Restaurant News again said that these integrations will ultimately replace workers for that particular station.

Sweetgreen, a popular salad chain, is planning on opening two new locations that will mostly automate the salad-making process, thereby cutting down on the number of workers needed, Sweetgreen co-founder and Chief Concept Officer Nic Jammet said in early-December.

And the list goes on and on.

Just two days ago The WinePress reported on the opening of a new autonomous McDonald’s location in Texas, which only employs some cooks. Last week Dubai announced that a restaurant with a robot model taking orders will open in 2023.

The rapper Jay-Z has also invested in autonomous pizza delivery trucks, for example. Furthermore, burger-making vending machines are something that are on the way.

Some restaurants have also implemented robotic waiters in an attempt to fill-in for the living workers that have been sparce since 2021.

SEE: AI Company Receives Millions In Funding To Completely Automate Restaurants And Study Customer’s Habits

And while CNBC and so many others attempt to skirt around the obvious, Casey Warman, an economics professor at Dalhousie University in Nova Scotia, says this will obviously shrink the workforce and the industry will not revert backwards.

Once the machines are in place, they’re not going to backwards, especially if there’s large cost savings.

He explained

SEE: China Uses Automated Robots To Make And Serve Food To Olympic Athletes

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AUTHOR COMMENTARY

I always love how they beat around the bush as concerning the future of the labor force, when it is so obvious everyone’s jobs are going to get replaced by a robot.

Again, moving into 2023 expect more of this to happen as wages continue to rapidly fall behind the pace of inflation, and the working force continually choses to play video games and live off of government cheese each month – a key feature of the autonomous smart cities.

[25] The desire of the slothful killeth him; for his hands refuse to labour. [26] He coveteth greedily all the day long: but the righteous giveth and spareth not.

Proverbs 21:25-26

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[7] Who goeth a warfare any time at his own charges? who planteth a vineyard, and eateth not of the fruit thereof? or who feedeth a flock, and eateth not of the milk of the flock? [8] Say I these things as a man? or saith not the law the same also? [9] For it is written in the law of Moses, Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. Doth God take care for oxen? [10] Or saith he it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes, no doubt, this is written: that he that ploweth should plow in hope; and that he that thresheth in hope should be partaker of his hope. (1 Corinthians 9:7-10).

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