Prep Starts Now campaign launched to help hospitality businesses reopen, digitise and grow

Stampede campaign backed by Visit Scotland offers free services and tools for businesses

EDINBURGH, Scotland, April 7, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Stampede, the Scottish hospitality software startup, today announced the launch of its Prep Starts Now campaign, with support from Visit Scotland and more than ten hospitality / tech organisations including Flipdish, Yoello, Trail and TP-Link. The campaign gives hospitality businesses access to many of the digital tools and services they need to reopen successfully during each post-lockdown stage, with partners offering free use of their services or significant discounts. 

The aim of the campaign is to help businesses in the hospitality and travel sectors reopen with confidence and future-proof. It offers the advice, guidance, support, tools and tech these businesses need to grow and recover without leaning on large technology platforms like Deliveroo and Uber Eats, which take profits away from the hospitality sector. For example, the services available via Prep Starts Now will help businesses create online menus, launch click & collect services, add takeaway, loyalty programmes and create engaging digital marketing content. The campaign also provides support on difficult reopening issues like hospitality recruitment and health and safety. 

In 2020, Stampede released footfall data based on 18 million hospitality customer interactions, demonstrating how slowly customers returned to hospitality venues post-lockdown – link. This was also a key driving force behind the campaign, ensuring businesses could prepare earlier, open more successfully and welcome more people back to their business. 

"We saw when British hospitality businesses reopened in the summer of 2020, that they can't be turned on and off like a tap. It took a long time for footfall and income to return to anywhere near normal levels," said Patrick Clover, Stampede CEO and founder. "The Prep Starts Now campaign enables hospitality businesses to prepare better and recover faster. Meanwhile, it's also our aim to help hospitality businesses stand on their own two feet, without platforms like Uber and Google, which hurt the industry as much as they help it. It's important that venues keep more of their profits and stay in control of their customer relationships, so that they can grow on their own terms. Many hospitality and travel businesses started the digitisation process last year out of necessity. They had to reopen in a certain way and be a certain kind of business, but this time they've had more time to prepare and now they can reopen as the business they want to be moving forward."

Notes for editors

See below for a list of Prep Starts Now partners, as well as supporting quotes from these businesses. For more information on these business and the various partner offers available, see the Prep Starts Now homepage https://stampede.ai/prep-start-now/ 

• Stampede
• 80 DAYS
• Big Flavour
• Flipdish
• For-Sight
• Hotel Benchmark 
• Pour
• Private House Stays
• StoreKit
• Trail
• TP-Link UK
• Travel Tech for Scotland
• Yoello
• Visit Scotland
• Xpressjobs

Allan Nelson For-Sight CEO & Co-founder – "Prep Starts Now is a great initiative to help the industry make the most of the opportunity as we reopen, both immediate and long term. Now is the time to prepare and to start engaging with your guests in a meaningful and personalised way. With an inflated staycation market this year, there exists a real opportunity for hospitality businesses to not only welcome these guests now, but to build loyalty and create new opportunity for the future.

"We believe that data is going to be central to helping the industry recover. With innovative technologies and a focus on data as a key business asset enabling strategic decisions, the industry can look ahead to a strong and sustainable recovery." 

Cassie Bouverie, Private House Stays Founder and CEO – "After months of uncertainty,  property owners are ready to welcome back guests,  and we are delighted to part of the #PrepStartsNow campaign.  Suppose you are tired of the complicated balancing act of managing multiple bookings platforms and seeing a considerable slice of your earnings disappear into the pockets of large corporations. In that case, Private House Stays is taking on the draconian OTA's.  We decided to build our own bespoke booking software where the owner is in control and able to generate bookings direct at 0% commission.  With all my knowledge, tech in the 90's, B&B in the Millennium, I am aiming to educate owners how to save thousands of pounds.

Ian Martin, Pour head of product – "We joined #PrepStartsNow because it's a great hub of resources and industry expertise to support the travel and hospitality industries reopening. At pour, our ordering technology helps businesses reassure customers and keep staff safe in the short-term, while improving efficiencies and business resiliency in the long term."

Stephen Brown, Big Flavour Director – "After a difficult last 12 months, we know that the industry, now more than ever, needs help to ensure it's in the best possible position to be successful. That's why we were delighted to be a part of the Prep Starts Now campaign, to use all of our experience to help businesses get ready for the future by working together with them and this fantastic collection of companies. 

Paul Wilson, Xpressjobs managing director – "Xpressjobs are delighted to be involved in this new and exciting business collaboration working under the trading banner of 'Prep Starts Now partners' .

"As a group at Xpress we believe we have a superb range of cost-effective products and services that can help meet the needs and requirements of many businesses as they plan to reopen. 

About Stampede

Stampede was founded by software developer and tech entrepreneur, Patrick Clover, to enable physical venues to engage with their customers more easily and effectively, and understand them better. From the independent coffee shop to global brands with thousands of sites - Stampede provides a level of customer insight previously only available to large corporations. It offers business owners better information on their customers through improved engagement and insights into consumer habits.

The company has grown rapidly and has served more than four million users from over 800 locations across the UK, Europe, US, Asia and South America.