About the Client

The Lost Dog Cafe has been serving up great pizza, hot sandwiches, and beer from around the world in Arlington, VA since 1985. Well known as a place to get great food and craft beer at great prices, the cafe also serves up a hefty slice of compassion with each pizza. Cafe owners Ross Underwood and Pam McAlwee have been rescuing stray dogs and cats almost as long as they have been in business and the effort continues. Since 2001, Lost Dog and Cat Rescue Foundation has saved the lives of over 18,000 dogs and cats, helping them connect with loving families and forever homes.

The Challenge

To support their successful and growing business, the owners of Lost Dog Cafe saw an opportunity to provide their customers with up to the minute information about their craft beer selection on mobile devices. A key draw for Lost Dog's customers is the excellent selection of beers they have on tap at each location to complement their gourmet pizza and sandwiches. A common question is "What's on Tap" and being able to answer that in a quick and convenient manner, is a great way to keep and build their customer relationships. With four locations now operating in Northern Virginia, keeping customers up to date with each location has become a priority for the owners and location managers.

The Solution

Segue Technologies® designed and developed native iOS and Android versions of the Lost Dog Cafe application for customers as well as a web-based Beer Manager portal for Lost Dog staff. The app allows customers to view real time tap lists for each Lost Dog location, in addition to storing information and integration with Lost Dog's order online service for pickup or delivery.

A user can "favorite" brews to receive real time notifications when beers are tapped. Customers can view all beers on tap, all beers ever tapped, or just a list of their favorites. The information provided by the app is up to date and accurate, as it doesn't rely on third-party services - beer lists are maintained by the bar staff through the Beer Manager portal.

The app pulls data from the administrative portal using REST API services. It also supports offline functionality and will sync favorites and settings once connectivity is restored. Notifications are sent through the Google Cloud Messaging (GCM) and Apple Push Notification (APN) services, providing customers with almost instantaneous updates of new beers being tapped. The administrative Beer Manager is a mobile responsive web application that allows
bar staff to make updates to the tap list right from their phones behind the bar.

The Beer Manager layout and content is optimized to fit the display of varying desktop, tablet, and mobile devices, providing streamlined access to the most used features in a fast and intuitive manner.