Calling Room Service From Home
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Keahe Nuuiwa is ready to make a
delivery for Room Service in Paradise
Noel Nedli is celebrating 10 years of his business, Room Service In Paradise, by expanding to several Pearl City/Aiea restaurants.
The Room Service In Paradise guide features area restaurants’ menus so clients can order food to be delivered to their home or office.
“I’m a convenience enthusiast myself,” says Nedli. “It’s great to provide something for people they never had before.”
With more than 50 restaurants across the island in Kailua, Honolulu and Pearl City participating, the company helps garner more business for the eateries.
“They get a lot of exposure from the menus going to the homes,” says Nedli. “They sell more food, and people will see the menu and come into the restaurants.”
The Los Angeles native, who moved to Hawaii in 1991, had a friend with a restaurant in Kailua who asked him do research into this type of business to help increase orders at the restaurant. Nedli’s best friend knew someone who actually did this type of business, so Nedli was coached over the phone for 90 minutes on how to run and market the business. Adding nine additional restaurants in Kailua, Nedli started Room Service In Paradise in a small bedroom in a house next door to his friend’s
restaurant in May 1996. The early books were done in newspaper tabloid format.
“People immediately started calling and ordering,” recalls Nedli. “They loved it. For the first time they could order something other than pizza: Mexican, American, Italian.”
A year later, restaurants in the Honolulu area were added starting with some in Kahala. Once the company expanded from dinner to lunch, the orders for corporate catering and lunches for doctors’ offices started soaring.
With between 50 and 60 employees helping out with the phones and delivery, Nedli counts on his mom, Erika, to handle administrative issues including bookkeeping and human resources. General manager Keith Gomex and local manager Michael Ennis oversee the main call center at Auahi Street and the driver depots in Kailua and Pearl City. The menus are mailed out in March and August, just like a magazine.
Nedli notes one of the challenges of running his business is that there are so many moving parts.
“You need an infrastructure to take calls, transmit to restaurants, and communicate with drivers,” explains Nedli. “Drivers need a place to park, they need to pick up food, check the orders and deliver the food. We really rely heavily on technology to take all the calls and the volume.”
He notes that with a strong economy and unemployment at a low rate, having enough drivers to fulfill orders can be a problem - but one he’s glad to have.
For more information on Room Service In Paradise, call 941-3463, 261-3463, or log onto www.rsiponline.com
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