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Tech Topics In This Article: Alabama startups, RestauranTech
In the fast-casual restaurant world, every second counts. Customers expect quick service, and restaurant owners are constantly looking for ways to streamline operations. While kitchens and their menus have become more efficient, the technology powering customer interactions hasn’t always kept pace. Birmingham-based entrepreneur Jègil Dugger saw an opportunity to change that. With his startup Pye, he’s bringing a sleek tech upgrade to the industry…one designed to help restaurant owners serve customers faster, smarter, and more efficiently than ever before.
Giving quick-serve restaurants the tools they need to serve customers, and giving customers a seamless checkout experience, is core to what Pye is all about. The startup, which launched in 2019, provides a new type of self-ordering kiosk solution to quick-serve restaurant owners around the country.
Pye allows for both cash and card payments, something that is unique in the kiosk market. This ensures that the unbanked or underbanked, who rely heavily on cash, are still able to use Pye’s technology and complete their transactions.
Kiosks cost between $200-$300 a month, depending on the model.
There is another thing that differentiates Pye from other POS and kiosk options out there: Its intentionally sleek design. With LED lights and curved screens, Pye kiosks aren’t just functional; they’re a visual statement. They add a modern, almost futuristic touch to any restaurant, enhancing the customer experience while streamlining operations.
From The Football Field To Startup Founder
Dugger grew up in Detroit, Michigan and Birmingham, Alabama before heading to UAB as a running back on their football team. After a career in the CFL (the Canadian Football League), Dugger spent his twenties trying to figure out what his identity would be post athletics. He moved into the casino vending space, growing his first company from zero to $2 million in revenue in two years.
“Being a professional athlete has a lot of unknowns, a lot of heartaches. You’re fighting for a contract, you’re fighting for opportunity on the team. And even when things don’t go your way, you have to be able to dust yourself off and go again. So that resilience that you learn from being an athlete is something that I use today, because in business, every day is not perfect.”
Dugger would face a professional setback in 2009 when he was arrested and then convicted on trademark infringement, spending one year in federal prison. He said that during that time, he focused on the future.
“I wanted to really prove during my incarceration that I could create something and I didn’t have to copy anything,” he told Hypepotamus.
Within a year after being released from prison, Dugger had a patent for a kiosk solution that allowed people to order food and drinks right from the slot machines they were playing on. He saw early success with that product, deploying it to customers in South America and Puerto Rico.
By 2016, he saw an opportunity to expand his self-service kiosk solutions to the wider hospitality and fast food industries. His goal was to “automate the walk-in experience for restaurants,” which ultimately led to the launch of Pye.
But not everyone was sold on his vision for the restaurant world at first.
“I remember years ago, someone told me that by starting this company, we were killing jobs,” Dugger told Hypepotamus. “Now we’re at a point where we’re actually saving businesses,” since the kiosks can help restaurants stay open or even scale despite labor shortages.
The New Restaurant World
Pye’s vision for the quick-serve restaurant industry was put to the test in 2020 when the pandemic hit, forcing Dugger and the team to adapt to the changing business climate.
“Going into the pandemic was a scary time for us,” given the work they were doing on touch screen technology. But once the initial fear of the pandemic faded, Pye realized they had another thing to navigate: The great resignation that hit the restaurant industry particularly hard.
This labor shortage, coupled with the growing demand for contactless solutions, proved to be a catalyst for Pye. Restaurants, struggling to find and retain staff, turned to automation to maintain efficiency and customer satisfaction.
While Pye is headquartered in Alabama, fan-favorite food chains across the country have taken note. Pye kiosks are currently being used at Dunkin’ Donuts location inside the Meadowlands, a popular sporting arena in New Jersey.
“We’ve been deploying nationwide and into Canada. So our focus right now is really expanding across the country and in different states, different restaurants, and whether it is a small business or a franchise.”
Pye, with a team of 18, has found strong support from Alabama’s entrepreneurial ecosystem. The startup has scaled through SSBCI grants as well as funding from the Alabama-based accelerator program Bronze Valley powered by gener8tor.
