Even a restaurant can incorporate poka-yoke devices.

Yesterday, I visited a great little casual dining place called Switch (which apparently has no website) for the first time. When I walked in, I was told that I could grab any table that had a little blue card sitting on top of it, like the one shown above. This card serves two purposes.

First, it tells customers which tables are ready. Nothing is left to be bussed, nothing needs to be cleaned - the table is ready for you. Easy enough.

Second, it tells the servers who needs attention. A server who sees a table with people sitting at it that still has a blue card knows that those guests have not yet been greeted or served. When the server comes to greet you, he or she simply grabs the card off of the table to let other servers know the guests have been greeted. So it prevents mistakes in a couple of different ways, and guests don’t even have to think about it.

Kudos to Switch. A little creativity can be a welcome surprise.

Posted by Robert on July 28th, 2007