A multi-city catering business can run on paper for a while. Voice memos, a notebook in the van, a follow-up that lives in someone’s head. Then you add a second city and the follow-up drops. The inventory count is yesterday’s. Procurement is a text that nobody filed.
That is the work behind BrewTrack — not a coffee brand site. It is the operating system for event requests, inventory, and procurement across cities, built for Event Espresso and used in production at the catering operation.
Notes do not travel between cities
Paper works when one person is the system. It fails when two vans, two warehouses, and a weekend event all need the same number. The count in the notebook is not the count on the pass. The request in a voice memo is not the job the warehouse pulled.
If you are still asking “who has the latest list?”, you do not have an operations problem you can solve with a prettier dashboard. You have a missing system of record.
What “one system” actually means
It is not a report you open on Mondays. It is the place an event request becomes a job, a job becomes a pull on inventory, and a short count becomes a purchase — without a second spreadsheet.
- The request is captured once, not in three apps.
- Inventory is the same number the van and the warehouse see.
- Procurement is a list, not a memory.
The work behind the order
Taking the order is the easy part. The work is everything after: does the van have the SKU, did procurement catch the short, is this event the same as the last one in that building. That layer is Order Intelligence — its own product, not a feature line on BrewTrack.
If the person on the pass still keeps a paper backup, you built a report, not a system. Start from the pass and work backward to the request.
If you are still on paper
Do not start with AI. Start with the object that already exists: the event, the SKU, the city. Put those in one place your team will open on a Saturday. Automation comes after the object is real. That is most of the apps and tools we ship.
Frequently asked questions
Can we just use a shared spreadsheet?
A sheet is a good spec. It is a bad multi-city system of record. Two people will fork it. See build the tool your team already invented in spreadsheets.
Do we need a customer-facing app first?
Usually no. The team that runs the event needs the truth more than the guest needs a branded portal.
Where does AI fit in catering ops?
After inventory and requests are real. A model can draft a pull list. A person should still accept it. Read review-and-apply.
What to do next
If your catering or events team is scaling past one city on paper, look at BrewTrack and Order Intelligence, or talk to us about the operating system — not another form.
