Page 10 - foodservice magazine Feb 2019

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STARTERS
Dimmi rebrands as TheFork
Australian online restaurant-booking platform Dimmi has been taken over by its international equivalent, TripAdvisor booking service TheFork, and all restaurants using Dimmi have been switched over.
Dimmi was founded in 2009 by Australian entrepreneur Stevan Premutico, and serves 4,500 restaurants nationwide. In 2015, Premutico sold the business to TripAdvisor.
The makeover came with a new name, new logo, new website and new apps. On the website and app, diners can search for restaurants by place, cuisine or price, and read TripAdvisor reviews before making a reservation. The goal of this rebrand, the company states, is to help restaurants boost their online presence and get more diners into their venues.
Staff allegedly underpaid at Dinner by Heston
Melbourne fine-diner Dinner by Heston has been accused of underpaying staff. Located in Melbourne’s Crown hotel and dining complex, this is British celebrity chef Heston Blumenthal’s only restaurant outside of the UK. A Fairfax investigation uncovered rosters that showed staff had worked up to 25 hours a week of unpaid overtime. This could mean mid-level chefs were earning between $15 and $17 an hour, which is well below the legal award rates. Estimates provided by a lawyer for the Hospo Voice union suggest individual chefs could have been underpaid by up to $30,000 a year. The Fair Work Ombudsman is conducting its own investigation.
Sydney’s Hartsyard has been sold to its chef
Hartsyard in Newtown, originally a fried-chicken diner before
it closed in 2017 and reopened as Hartsyard 2.0 to serve more contemporary food, has now been sold. Owners Naomi Hart and Gregory Llewellyn stepped away after seven years, handing the restaurant to head chef Jarrod Walsh, who took over in January.
“The friends we’ve made through guests, staff and the industry have added such richness to our lives. ... We are braver but more cautious, calmer, wiser, more nuanced, more perceptive, so grateful and so, so tired. It’s time,” says Hart. Hart and Llewellyn will remain at Hartsyard’s casual sister venue, Wish Bone, giving the facade and menu an update.
New food delivery app aims to reduce food waste
Kloopr is a new online food delivery platform that aims to reduce food waste and maintain a lower carbon footprint than its competitors, while also cutting costs for restaurants. Founded in Melbourne, it encourages venues to offer reduced menus and a set number of portions per dish on the app, giving the chefs a better indication of how much stock they will need to order.
Most third party delivery platforms take between 20 to 30 per cent of the food price, but Kloopr will take 15 per cent.
The $3.50 delivery fee for each order will be donated to Foodbank Victoria, the state’s largest not-for-profit food relief organisation.