Panda Express just announced its first Cloud Kitchen location in San Francisco. Opening its doors on Friday, March 12, the Panda Digital Kitchen will be the restaurant’s first location that will focus solely on cooking and fulfilling online orders, optimized with new efficient equipment that will help Panda Express employees prepare freshly made American Chinese dishes more quickly.
Since the pandemic began, Panda Express has more than tripled its already strong delivery business due to increased demand for convenience from consumers. At the beginning of the pandemic, Panda worked to meet guest needs by launching its own delivery platform – Panda Delivers – to give consumers the chance to order from the restaurant directly instead of third-party services.
As this demand continued, the brand tailored its business approach by creating spaces that would focus exclusively on delivering quick and quality food. While the Panda Digital Kitchen will be roughly a third of the size of a normal kitchen, restaurant leaders made certain that the space dedicated plenty of room to prepare ingredients without changing the quality of food Panda Express is known for.
At every Panda Express location, including this Panda Digital Kitchen, employees prepare each entrée directly in the kitchen daily, hand-cutting fresh veggies and wok-cooking and grilling all ingredients in small batches. San Francisco-based guests will have the opportunity to order from the Panda Digital Kitchen through the Panda Delivers platform, as well as third-party delivery services.
Panda Digital Kitchen is the first step in providing speedy dining solutions to guests on- the-go, and Panda will continue testing different solutions in 2021 to help tap into this growing trend.
