In this Pas-de-Calais restaurant, a robot is now responsible for serving drinks
Robot servers are coming to the north of France. For the past two weeks, a robot coming straight from China has been serving drinks in this Asian restaurant in a small town near Boulogne-sur-Mer.
Since the end of December, a white plastic silhouette has held the attention of customers, in this Asian restaurant in Saint-LĂ©onard, near Boulogne-sur-Mer, in Pas-de-Calais.
It has now been two weeks since a robot called Alexa joined the staff of the all-you-can-eat buffet restaurant, Gourmet d’Asie, as reported by our colleagues from France-Blue. Apron on his back and trays in hand, the robot knows the table plan by heart: he walks between them and takes care of serving drinks to customers.
“The idea came to us in the context of the Covid crisis,” the manager of the establishment, Lina Zhou, told BFMTV.com. “In China, we see this everywhere. It’s a good way to reduce the number of direct contacts with customers, in these times of pandemic”.
However, Alexa does not take orders from customers. She simply goes back and forth between the kitchens and the tables in the dining room, after having been programmed beforehand by a waiter. There, customers can retrieve their drinks and all they have to do is pat her on the arm for Alexa to turn back. “This robot is not intended to one day replace the four servers of the establishment”, insists Lina Zhou, the manager of this restaurant installed in the town since 2014.
“It helps us a bit, but it is still far from replacing a human server”, smiles the manager, who recognizes that the services of her robot are limited: “she does not take orders, does not clear tables”.
“And when it is really crowded, we don’t use it because it can waste more time than any other choose. It must be said that we are still much faster than it!”, S still amuses this manager of eight employees.
In fact, Alexa is mainly there to amuse the gallery, in this case the customers at the table and the children. “It’s great fun because you can ask him what you want”, explains Lina Zhou: “the weather forecast for the day, addresses, which route to take, and even to sing songs”. This can come in handy when customers are celebrating an anniversary, for example.
“For the past two weeks, we have had clients who come simply through word of mouth, because they have heard about it and are curious to see what happens,” explains the manager. As for the children, “they adore him!”, The manager still rejoices, “they spend their time following to ask him questions. You just have to be careful that they do not get in his way. may cause a few small drinking accidents on the ground, as we have already seen, “she jokes.
At the end of 2021, Gourmet d’Asie invested some 10,000 euros by ordering two copies of this human-shaped robot, designed and manufactured in China. In a little over a week, a second robot, with a masculine appearance this time, will join the Gourmet d’Asie staff.