Erika Adams

While Wendy's emphasis on value deals like its popular 4 for $4 menu option got customers into the restaurants, the company failed to convert those diners into higher-paying customers.

CEO Randy Garutti is right: Shake Shack has "got to win" on labor in order to keep up with the company's wide-ranging expansion plans.

Automation has some key benefits to the industry. But we'd like a closer look under the hood before Spyce gets anointed (again) as the next great thing.

Unlike some of its competitors, Bloomin' Brands is bullish on the potential of delivery, take-out, and catering to eventually make up 30 percent of the company's overall sales. They are willing to invest in everything from an in-house delivery team to store remodels with specific delivery-friendly components to make it happen.

Finally, customers no longer have to download Shake Shack's app in order to place a digital order for pickup. We expect digital sales to rise for the chain now that they'll be able to reach more customers online.

This won't be the only time that we hear this sentiment from industry CEOs who have been dragging their feet on offering delivery, updating loyalty programs, and utilizing in-store technology. On the plus side, they get to learn from others' mistakes.

Like every delivery service has been saying all year, rapid market expansion is key for the services who will be successful in this space. In the race to be the one to offer the best deal to everybody, Grubhub claims it's the one to beat right now.

We can already search through hotel and flight bookings on Google. It's about time that we're able to do that for restaurant reservations, too.

Custom tipping screens from Toast, Square, and similar digital point-of-sale systems can, in some cases, double an employee’s paycheck. In an extremely tight labor market, it can be a big selling point.

Domino's isn't so much a pizza company as a delivery and technology juggernaut, and that's allowing it to sidestep a lot of the industry's operational issues.