San Diego's 2014 Restaurant of the Year Matches World-Class Food With High Tech Automation — Thanks to ELAN
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When world-class chefs open a new restaurant, they want to create a unique dining experience that keeps guests enticed from the moment they walk through the doors until the next day when they inevitably tell all their friends about it. Richard Blais, winner of Bravo’s Top Chef All-Stars and host of several network television cooking shows, does this by using science and technology to offer dishes unlike any other. Think nitrogen-frozen desserts that melt as your waiter pours hot fudge over them.
In his new San Diego restaurant Juniper & Ivy, which was named the city’s Restaurant of the Year by the San Diego Union Tribune, Blais matched his penchant for high-tech cooking with a comprehensive audio-video, security and climate control system that ensures the restaurant operates smoothly from opening to closing, every day. Using an ELAN g! Control Systemdesigned and installed by local integrator Paradise InfoTech, the staff at Juniper & Ivy has instant control over all of the lights, 11 distinct zones of audio and 10 zones of climate control, ensuring every guest has the best experience possible.
According to General Manager Dan Pena, “The guest experience is everything. We pay close attention to how bright it is in the restaurant, we make sure the temperature stays within a certain comfort range and maintain the desired ambience with specific genres of music. It’s amazing to be able to make changes on the floor immediately, rather than having to walk back and forth from the dining area to an office, and it’s freed me up to focus all my attention on the staff and the guests, rather than having to spend time worrying about the atmosphere.”
It’s a well-known fact that music can set the mood for any environment. Quality, volume and song choice are of the utmost importance. With the ELAN g! system running things behind the scenes, select Juniper & Ivy staff can make adjustments right from their mobile phones to cater to any guests’ request. Crucial to this operation is the separation of zones, offering different volume levels and audio sources for the main dining area, three semi-private dining cubes, a private dining room, two offices, the kitchen, the bar, the lounge and the outdoor patio. Each of these zones also has its own climate control, so a private party can set the temperature to exactly what they want.
“Restaurants, bars and retail stores are all about the customer experience,” said Zack Paradise, owner of Paradise InfoTech. “What ELAN’s technology does is give the owners and managers of these establishments full, instant control of the environment so they can make small adjustments throughout the day to appeal to their customers. It also frees up more of their time to manage staff and ensure the human operations run smoothly, without having to worry about the infrastructure or the building itself.”
Behind the scenes the technology goes even deeper, providing enhanced security and streamlining opening and closing the restaurant. Using the ELAN g! app on their mobile phones and house iPads, select staff can view any of the establishment’s 13 IP video cameras even when they are off-site. This gives owner Michael Rosen extra peace of mind, because he can ensure that everything is going smoothly no matter where he is in the world, and if anything does go wrong, he can log in to view it firsthand.
“The remote capabilities of the system mean that I can ensure that everything is going as planned without the need for me to be on-site seven days a week,” Pena said. “Also, the implementation has been flawless. The ELAN control system is so easy to use, I would really be surprised if anyone couldn’t learn it right away. My managers have full control over the restaurant, which makes their jobs easier, and it helps us save energy by showing if the air conditioning and lighting has all been shut down after closing. Every restaurant could benefit form the control offered by the ELAN g! system.”
Paradise InfoTech was founded as a full-service IT company in San Diego with a mission to provide the highest customer satisfaction and the best end user experience possible. In response to customer demand, the company expanded into AV solutions and sophisticated automation systems and employs dedicated staff to meet the distinct needs of enterprise, corporate, retail and residential clients.