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Fall Movies, Fresh Experiences: How GoTab Is Helping Dine-In Theaters Bust Lines & Keep the Magic on Screen

Fall is the perfect season to cozy up with a good movie, whether it’s a Halloween horror classic, a sweeping drama, or the latest superhero blockbuster. For dine-in theaters, it’s also a golden opportunity to deliver a guest experience so seamless and so immersive, that technology disappears into the background leaving only the magic of the movie and the memory of great food and service.

Modernizing a dine-in theater isn’t just about adding plush seating. It’s about speeding up service, eliminating the dreaded concession lines, and ensuring every guest can focus on the film without missing a moment. That’s where GoTab comes in. We give dine-in theaters the tools to serve faster, operate smarter, and wow guests from the previews to the closing credits.

Before the Show Begins - Please Bust the Popcorn Lines!

Nothing kills pre-movie excitement faster than a line that snakes past the ticket counter. With GoTab’s QR code ordering and handheld devices, guests can skip the queue entirely.

At Schulman Theatres in Texas, this approach is a game-changer. Guests simply scan a QR code from their seat, order and pay for their snacks and drinks, and have everything delivered without missing the opening scene. Within the first month of launching GoTab at one location, Schulman saw sales triple compared to a previous QR system, even with lower attendance. The convenience factor keeps guests ordering more, more often.

Why it works: Guests don’t have to choose between grabbing concessions and getting to their seat on time. Staff spend less time working the register and more time delivering food and creating a welcoming atmosphere.

Make The Food and Drinks Come So Fast It Feels Like Magic

In a darkened theater, speed is everything. Guests want hot popcorn, cold drinks, and zero interruptions. GoTab’s ordering system integrates directly with a kitchen display system (KDS), cutting out wasted steps and slashing ticket times.

At Aloma Cinema & Grill in Winter Park, Florida, QR ordering from seats has cut service time in half. Guests who order via QR receive food up to 48% faster than traditional methods. “Sometimes guests get their drinks or popcorn within 20 seconds,” manager Jim Matthes says. “They’re blown away.”

Why it works: Guests stay immersed in the movie while servers and kitchen staff move in sync behind the scenes. That kind of speed doesn’t just impress, it leads to bigger tips and happier teams.

Let Guests Order How They Want, When They Want

Whether it’s from a lounge chair in the Green Room Café before the film or from a recliner halfway through a suspenseful scene, flexibility is key. GoTab lets theaters blend QR ordering, handheld point-of-sale (POS), and traditional ordering at a stationary POS into one unified system.

Schulman Theatres’ VP of Operations Jacob Schulman loves that flexibility. Parents can relax in the lobby with a drink while the kids play in the arcade. And they can still order food to their movie seats. Moving between different areas of the venue doesn’t mean leaving the ordering experience behind.

Why it works: Guests are empowered to control their own experience. Whether they want personal interaction with a server or to tap a few buttons on their phone, they get it.

Extend the Experience Beyond the Screen

Modern dine-in theaters can (and should) be more than just a place to watch a movie. Adding destinations within the venue like bars, cafes, or lounges gives guests reasons to visit even without a ticket in hand.

Aloma Cinema & Grill’s new Green Room Café is a perfect example. Guests come for Chef Adrian Mann’s creative lunch specials, linger over craft cocktails, and sometimes stay for a movie afterward. With GoTab running across both the café and the theaters, the experience feels unified. Guests in the same party don’t need separate tabs, and staff can serve them anywhere.

Why it works: This approach turns a two-hour movie night into a half-day or full-day outing, boosting average spend while building community connections.

Choose Tech That Disappears Into the Background

Great theater tech isn’t about flashy gadgets. It’s about removing friction so the focus stays on the guest experience. For Aloma Cinema & Grill, that meant replacing a clunky legacy POS with a mobile-first platform that reduced credit card fees, increased order accuracy, and kept guests in their seats.

At Schulman Theatres, GoTab is evolving alongside their expansion plans, planning future integrations with arcade payment systems (via Intercard) and ticketing platforms (via RTS) to create a true “single pane of glass” for both guests and operators.

Why it works: When guests don’t have to think about how to order, pay, or get service, they can focus on the experience, and that’s the real product theaters are selling.

Train Teams to Be Experience Specialists, Not Only Order Takers

With tech handling transactions, staff can focus on hospitality, greeting guests, making recommendations, and ensuring food arrives quickly and quietly.

Both Aloma and Schulman have seen that when servers spend less time walking tickets back and forth, tips go up. At Aloma, average ticket sizes have also increased because guests feel more comfortable ordering throughout the film without needing to wave someone down.

Why it works: Staff morale improves when their role shifts from runner to host, and guests feel more cared for without constant interruptions.

Dine-in Theater Modernization Success Stories

  • Aloma Cinema & Grill – Winter Park, FL

Florida’s original dine-in theater embraces modern tech with QR ordering, handhelds, and a KDS, cutting service times nearly in half while expanding into all-day dining with the Green Room Café.

  • Schulman Theatres – Texas & Arkansas

A century-old family brand triples sales at one location with GoTab QR ordering, unites movies, bowling, arcade, and dining under one roof, and sets the stage for a seamless, flexible future.

Fall Movies, Faster Service: Why Now Is the Time to Upgrade Theater Guest Experience Tech

Fall brings a packed release schedule with Oscar hopefuls, family-friendly holiday hits, and seasonal horror films. It also marks a shift in guest expectations: after a summer of blockbusters and outdoor events, people crave comfort, speed, and a little bit of indulgence.

By modernizing with GoTab now, theaters can:

  • Eliminate pre-show congestion
  • Serve faster without sacrificing quality
  • Increase per-cap sales through flexible ordering
  • Keep guests coming back for food, drinks, and community events—not just the latest release

Final Scene: Make the Experience the Star

Technology should never overshadow the experience. The goal is to make service so seamless that guests don’t notice it at all. They just remember how easy it was to get their favorite snack, how quickly their drink arrived, and how they never had to miss a scene. GoTab helps theaters like Aloma Cinema & Grill, Schulman Theatres and many others deliver that magic every day. When the tech fades into the background, the guest experience takes center stage, and that’s a blockbuster in any season.

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Situated “in the heart of it all, yet tranquil enough to make you feel away from it all too,” The Limelight Hotel Snowmass offers 99 hotel rooms and 11 residences, as well as footsteps-to-gondola access in winter and summer — right in the middle of Snowmass Base Village.

The Situation

Especially over the last few years, the Limelight Hotels IT team had witnessed a significant shift to contactless technology in the hospitality industry. After evaluating friction points in the guest journey, aligning with modern technology platforms in their restaurant was determined to be an effective way to offer elevated contactless dining experiences to their guests while also evolving their technology platforms to continue to support long-term company goals. Limelight Hotel partnered with GoTab to provide an enhanced on-demand dining experience on par with the brand’s reputation for exceptional guest service.

The Solution

Reducing Staff Touch Points Without Sacrificing Guest Experience

Guests are now able to begin a tab from their room or the property’s restaurant by scanning a QR code, texting a link to friends or family members on the ski slope to add in their orders, then meeting up together at the patio or lodge to enjoy their meal and après ski festivities without interruption. By streamlining tasks like inputting orders and processing payments, this eliminates friction for hotel staff and allows them to focus on delivering renowned guest service for a memorable experience. Since partnering with GoTab, Limelight Snowmass has consistently seen higher check averages and sales.

“We found the Point of Sale platforms we were looking at offered the guest and staff limited opportunities to further reduce touch points or improve the traditional restaurant experience. The GoTab platform enabled the guest to take an active role over the flow of their experience while simultaneously reducing touch points and further streamlining restaurant operations.”Nick Giglio, Manager of Hotel IT Operations, The Little Nell Hotel Group

According to the Limelight Hotels team, some of the other platforms that were evaluated were either missing some of the pieces they were looking for, had weak customer support models, or had little willingness to develop integrations to existing hotel platforms already in place. To that end, GoTab integrated with cloud-based platform, Infor. Together, GoTab and Infor are providing dynamic solutions to support central, efficient service across hotel amenities and deliver exceptional guest experiences.

“Previously, guests would call down to the restaurant to begin an order from their room or while they were out enjoying the ski slopes. Using GoTab, guests can now place orders from anywhere on the resort, giving them the on-demand service they want without interrupting their day. GoTab empowers us to give control to the guest, reducing touch points and streamlining overall restaurant operations, making Limelight Hotel the resort of choice for Snowmass.”Nick Giglio, Manager of Hotel IT Operations, The Little Nell Hotel Group

Since introducing GoTab, The Limelight Hotel has seen a consistent level of upsells and items sold per check resulting in additional revenue capture. They have been able to maintain service levels in their restaurants during periods when there was reduced staffing available without significantly diminishing the guest experience.

The Benefits

Eliminate Phone Orders – Take Orders from the Slopes. Guests can start a tab from their room or on the mountain without interrupting the flow of their day.

Future-Proofed Technologies – Delivering elevated contactless ordering via integration with the Infor hotel management platform.

Eliminating Friction in the Guest Journey – Maintaining service levels during periods of reduced staff without diminishing the guest experience.

  • Eliminating Friction in the Guest Journey – Maintaining service levels during periods of reduced staff without diminishing the guest experience.
  • Eliminating Friction in the Guest Journey – Maintaining service levels during periods of reduced staff without diminishing the guest experience.
  • Eliminating Friction in the Guest Journey – Maintaining service levels during periods of reduced staff without diminishing the guest experience.
  • Eliminating Friction in the Guest Journey – Maintaining service levels during periods of reduced staff without diminishing the guest experience.

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