A robot named Pearl could bring your food to the table at this Bradenton restaurant
The robots are coming, and seemingly everywhere, from factories assembling automobiles to homes where they vacuum floors.
And most recently, to at least one Bradenton restaurant.
For several months, restaurateur John Horne has been using a robot named “Pearl” to deliver food to tables at Anna Maria Oyster Bar Landside at 6906 14th St. W. The Landside is the only one of Horne’s four restaurant locations where the robot is being tried.
“We are pleased with the first stab at it. Our goal is to enable our servers to be closer to their guests,” Horne said recently.
Pearl stands a few feet high, has three shelves for entrees, runs with a musical tone (as if to say I’m in the vicinity), and senses obstacles in its path. Depending on the obstacle, it may stop, or alter its route.
Pearl’s job is deliver orders from the kitchen to the diner’s table. At the table, the wait staff member who took the order removes the plate of calamari, fried shrimp or other platter from the robot and places it on the table. Pearl then returns to the kitchen and picks up the next order.
Of course, it doesn’t do all this on its own. There are people in the kitchen preparing the food and placing it on Pearl. They also have to tell they robot where to deliver the food.
Horne reasons that if his wait staff doesn’t constantly have to run back and forth between customers and the kitchen, they can provide better service to diners and perhaps add a table or two to their service area.
Besides, Pearl doesn’t mind running back to the kitchen to fetch a bit of tartar sauce or ketchup that a diner requested.
A robot is a plus during a time of worker shortage as the world starts to hopefully emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic.
“It’s a beta test, and like any early technology, each generation will be better,” Horne said.
Like cars that can automatically park themselves, the robot has sensors that allow it to navigate the restaurant. And like a home vacuum, the robot has also mapped the restaurant.
Customers have reacted with surprise and amusement.
“I get more people taking photos of it. I like seeing their faces when the robot rolls up,” Horne said.
While Pearl can deliver entrees, Horne is not using it to deliver drinks or soups to avoid spills.
“We have modified parts of the restaurant to remove thresholds,” Horne said. “It can go from carpet to tile, and we can also use the robot at a social gathering.”
Courtney Prentice has worked at the Anna Maria Oyster Bar Landside as a manager for about six years.
“It was a little different,” Prentice said of the robot’s arrival. “But it is a help, especially if we forget a condiment, and it has never gone to the wrong table.
Horne and his staff continue to find that the robot has other capabilities, including saying “happy birthday.”
Mike Teitelbaum, territory account manager for Bear Robotics, said with the staffing shortage, robots are becoming more attractive to employers.
“We have a bunch of them out there. Robots have become a lot more relevant. They are going to be everywhere before you know it,” he said.
Bear Robotics is the brainchild of restaurant experts and tech entrepreneurs.
“We understand the hospitality space because it’s where we started, getting our hands into everything from waiting tables to washing dishes. And when faced with the busy work, we found a better way forward,” the company website says.
“Now, we’re engineering smarter solutions, allowing servers to excel by automating repetitive tasks and elevating restaurant experiences. And we’re doing it with robots,” the company says.
For more information about the robot, visit https://www.bearrobotics.ai/.
