The challenge of authentic at scale
Tasty African Food is the UK's largest West African restaurant group. Founded in 2000, they've grown from a single location to 29 restaurants: 14 equity stores and 15 franchises. They operate a central production unit (CPU) that manufactures all food for those restaurants, plus they're expanding into retail (Sainsbury's now, with pipelines to Tesco, Morrisons, and Ocado) and direct-to-consumer channels.
Before Nory, the operation was held together by spreadsheets and phone calls. Orders came in at 7pm via calls or emails. A night operator manually logged each one. For just eight locations in 2019, this process took six hours.
The bigger problem was invisibility. Food cost variance, the "silent killer" for restaurants - was happening everywhere and no one knew.
It's like having a water leak in your house and not knowing for two years. You just keep paying the bill without realising why. Except restaurant owners don't have anyone to call - they have to catch it themselves.
Stephen Oladimeji, Head of IT Systems at Tasty African Food
How Nory transformed operations
From chaos to 20-minute ordering
Orders now come through Nory. All 29 locations. In about 20 minutes total.
More importantly, orders are now built on demand forecasts. Franchisees no longer order based on gut feeling - they order based on predicted sales. For a business with 70+ products, that shift from intuition to data is transformative.
Now we can see exactly what's selling and what's sitting. If a product isn't moving, we know. If it's wasting, we know. If there's variance, we catch it.
Stephen Oladimeji, Head of IT Systems, Tasty African Food
The puff dough problem
The signature puff dough, one of Tasty's best-selling pastries - revealed the scale of the invisibility problem. Sales data showed the product was moving, but when they cross-referenced sales against production costs and portion sizes, something didn't add up. Restaurant teams were portioning it too big.
Before Nory, there was no way to see this. Staff made different-sized portions based on intuition. No standardisation. No tracking.
Once they spotted the portioning variance with Nory, they standardised portion sizes, retrained staff, and monitored continuously. The impact was immediate across all 29 locations.
We want people to come in and have a full meal for under £10. To do that, we have to control every detail. If we don't catch the small variances, we either go out of business or we have to raise prices.
Stephen Oladimeji, Head of IT Systems, Tasty African Food
Consistency across franchises
Tasty has 15 franchisees running locations independently. The challenge: how do you ensure a franchisee in one part of London operates the same way as equity store managers?
The answer: Nory enforces it. Every franchisee must use Nory to order from the CPU. Every franchisee is required to check variance at least twice a week. Regional managers can see performance across all sites in real-time.
For franchisees using Nory's workforce module, the benefit is clearer: they can see total prime cost (food + labour) and plan accordingly.
Scaling from 22 to 29 in two years - planning for 100
Tasty's CEO has committed to reaching 100 locations in five years. Most chains can't do this without losing operational consistency. But Tasty has built a playbook in Nory.
Every new location inherits:
- Standardised ordering workflows
- Real-time variance tracking
- Forecasting built on actual sales patterns
- Mandatory consistency rules across all sites
Before Nory, adding a new location meant building everything from scratch. Now, they inherit the controls immediately. That's how we can grow from 22 to 29 in two years and still plan for 100 in five.
Stephen Oladimeji, Head of IT Systems, Tasty African Food
Authenticity at scale
Tasty was founded on authentic African cuisine. The CPU exists to maintain consistency across all locations. But distributing to 29 locations, plus retail channels and D2C - while maintaining margins is complex.
That's where Nory fits. It gives the operations team real-time visibility into what's selling, what's wasting, and where costs are leaking.
AI is probably the most important tool you need today to stay ahead. If you're not using it in your business, you'll struggle to compete. We want to be the first African restaurant group to scale this way — to Sainsbury's, to Ocado, everywhere. Nory helps us do that without losing who we are.
Stephen Oladimeji, Head of IT Systems, Tasty African Food
What's next
Tasty's immediate priorities with Nory are inventory features in development — templates for stock transfers and production workflows. They're also pushing for auto-blocking of out-of-stock products.
But the real goal is bigger: 100 locations in five years. With Nory handling the operational backbone, that's looking increasingly possible.