Tradition Restaurants Target Younger Customers with Tablet Implimentation

Applebee's of DineEquity DIN announced this week that tablets will be installed in every table of its 1,860 locations in the United States by end of 2014.

Over 100,000 Intel-backed INTC tablets from Presto NPK will be be used by customers for ordering food and paying bills in addition to offering entertainment features such as streaming music, games, and connection to social media sites.

The move to tablets is designed to reduce overhead expenses to counteract the stagnant growth in the recent years and to lower the price of food items to draw in the younger generation.

The majority of the recent decline in traditional restaurants' sales has resulted from the 'millennials' shifting towards the "fast-casual" restaurants such as Chipotle CMG and Subway, where they expect highly customizable restaurant quality food at a speed of fast food chains.

In addition to the shift, marketing firm NPD Group stated that the millennials' overall spending on dining out has fell 16 percent over the past four years.

The tablet's ability to offer more of a casual dining experience and higher level of customization may help restaurants recapture the millenials' who are moving away from the traditional dining experience.

While the integration of tablets and shift towards "fast-casual" dining experience does present a significant threat to human servers, the chunkiness shown in the initial implementation will keep the jobs safe for now.

The tablet has been noted as difficult to navigate by many elderly diners who may request a human server to take their orders.

Few servers have also noted that customers often place unwanted orders by mistake and that the electronic ordering system makes it easier for minors to purchase a drink without getting carded.

Applebee's stated that they plan to retain the same number of employees for the time being.