Why Digital Ordering Has Become a Growth Driver for Fast-Casual Restaurants

Digital ordering was once an added convenience for restaurant customers. Today, it’s part of the fast-casual business model’s infrastructure.

Nearly 75% of all restaurant traffic now occurs off-premises, according to the National Restaurant Association’s 2025 Off-Premises Restaurant Trends report. Mobile ordering has also become mainstream: 57% of adults use it, rising to 74% among millennials and 65% among Gen Z adults.

For fast-casual brands, that shift has changed more than how customers place an order. Digital ordering can make restaurants easier to access, connect transactions to loyalty programs, provide insights into customer behavior, and create additional opportunities to encourage repeat visits.

For franchise investors, the key question is no longer whether a restaurant offers digital ordering. It is how effectively the brand uses that technology to support customer acquisition, retention, and restaurant-level growth.

Digital Ordering Has Become Part of the Restaurant Experience

Off-premises dining is particularly important to limited-service restaurants. While nearly 75% of restaurant traffic occurs off-premises overall, the percentage is even higher among limited-service restaurants. In 2019, off-premises orders accounted for 76% of limited-service restaurant traffic. By 2024, that figure had increased to 83%, according to the National Restaurant Association.

Restaurants have adapted accordingly. Forty percent of limited-service operators reported making changes to their restaurants or parking areas to accommodate off-premises orders. Fifty-eight percent said off-premises dining now represents a larger share of their sales than it did in 2019.

Convenience Has Become Part of the Value Equation

Restaurant value is often discussed in terms of price. But today’s consumers think more broadly.

The National Restaurant Association reports that convenience and quality also influence their off-premises ordering decisions. Its research identifies speedy service, good customer service, intuitive ordering and payment technology, value offers, and loyalty programs as five key components of repeat off-premises business.

Digital ordering can address several of those expectations at once. Customers can place an order when it is convenient, customize it before arriving, pay electronically, and reduce the time needed to complete the transaction at the restaurant.

This can be especially relevant for fast-casual concepts built around customization. The technology has to make a potentially complex order easy for the customer to build and for the restaurant to execute.

Digital Orders Can Turn Transactions Into Customer Relationships

One of the more important differences between a traditional restaurant transaction and a first-party digital transaction is what happens after the order is completed.

An anonymous customer can walk into a restaurant, pay for a meal, and leave. The restaurant may know what was sold, but relatively little about the person who purchased it.

Digital ordering can create a different relationship when it connects to customer accounts, loyalty programs, and other first-party data. A restaurant can potentially understand how often a customer visits, what they typically order, which offers they respond to, and how their behavior changes over time.

Restaurant operators increasingly recognize the value of these capabilities. A 2025 Restaurant Technology Outlook survey conducted by Restaurant Business and Nation’s Restaurant News found that 46% of 550 restaurant operators planned to prioritize technology spending on digital marketing. Another 38% identified digital ordering channels as a priority investment. Among fast-casual operators specifically, 60% identified digital marketing as their top technology priority.

But collecting data and effectively using it are two different things. Nearly one-third of operators surveyed said they probably were not optimizing the customer data they collected.

That distinction is important. The potential value of digital ordering does not come simply from moving an order from the counter to a smartphone. It comes from connecting digital transactions with a broader system for understanding and engaging customers.

Digital Ordering and Loyalty Can Reinforce Each Other

Loyalty programs illustrate how those digital relationships can translate into customer behavior.

Circana analyzed receipt data from members and nonmembers across four of the largest U.S. restaurant loyalty programs. They found that loyalty traffic doubled between 2019 and 2024. Loyalty members accounted for 39% of visits to those restaurants, and loyalty traffic increased 5% in 2024 even as overall restaurant traffic declined 2%.

The findings also provide useful context about what restaurant loyalty actually means.

Loyalty members still patronize multiple restaurant brands. However, Circana found that they make 22% more restaurant visits annually than nonmembers. Loyalty members also visit restaurants where they belong to the loyalty program twice as often as nonmembers.

In other words, a loyalty program does not necessarily create an exclusive customer. But it can give a restaurant another way to compete for a greater share of that customer’s restaurant visits.

How Bubbakoo’s Connects Digital Ordering, Data, and Loyalty

Bubbakoo’s Burritos has made digital ordering part of a broader technology and marketing ecosystem.

Customers can interact with the brand through its website, mobile app, loyalty platform, and digital ordering channels. The company also uses Toast for point-of-sale technology, Thanx for loyalty and customer engagement, and Bikky for guest analytics. Together, these systems connect ordering, customer data, loyalty, and marketing, giving Bubbakoo’s more information about customer behavior and additional ways to encourage repeat visits.

Bubbakoo’s Vice President of Marketing Alex Jano says the company examines information including visit cadence, ordering behavior, and menu preferences to better understand its customers.

This can help the brand make marketing more relevant. A customer who regularly orders vegetarian items, for example, may respond differently to a promotion than someone who consistently chooses spicy menu options.

The company’s loyalty program provides another connection. Customers can earn rewards and receive access to offers and promotions, while the underlying technology helps Bubbakoo’s better understand guest behavior and preferences.

As Jano explained, the objective is to use that information to “create more personalized experiences and deliver offers that truly resonate.”

Digital Infrastructure Can Support Multi-Unit Growth

Digital ordering also takes on another dimension for a multi-unit franchise operator.

Opening additional restaurants requires more than replicating the physical location. Operators need systems that work consistently across multiple units while still allowing each restaurant to build relationships in its local market.

A connected digital platform can support ordering, loyalty, customer engagement, promotions, and data collection across multiple restaurants. Corporate marketing can run broader campaigns and maintain brand consistency, while franchisees can use local-store marketing to build relationships in their communities.

For a multi-unit, multi-brand candidate, digital infrastructure is another area for due diligence. The question is not simply whether a franchisor has an app or accepts online orders. It is whether the underlying systems support customer acquisition, engagement, and retention as the operator adds locations.

Digital Ordering Is Becoming Part of the Growth Infrastructure

Fast-casual restaurants still depend on the fundamentals of the restaurant business. Customers need a reason to visit, the food has to deliver, operations must be consistent, and the overall experience has to encourage customers to return.

Digital ordering doesn’t replace these principles.

But it can make the restaurant easier to access while connecting orders with loyalty, customer data, and marketing. As off-premises dining has become a larger part of restaurant traffic, those capabilities have become increasingly important to how fast-casual brands attract and retain customers.

To learn more about the Bubbakoo’s Burritos franchise opportunity, visit the franchise website and download the Franchise Information Guide.

Sources