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texaslogo Codesigned and Texas Roadhouse

How IntranetPro helped pivot business during the COVID-19 pandemic

restaurant

800 +

Restaurants
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85,000 +

Employees
users

6,000 +

Users
IntranetPro allowed us to quickly assemble training materials and disseminate to all stores. This helped the company pivot quickly to a new model. Eliminated a lot of extra emails and centralized our tools.​
Hernan Mujica
Hernan Mujica​
Chief Information Officer, Texas Roadhouse,
Texas Roadhouse
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Be prepared to pivot

Texas Roadhouse is an American Steakhouse restaurant chain, headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky. Known for their food, culture, and free peanuts - Texas Roadhouse is an American institution. With over 70,000 employees and 700+ locations in 49 states, the publicly traded (TxRH) company is also a powerhouse in the casual dining sector.

The company planned in 2018 to transform its Intranet. After a thorough review of options, they chose IntranetPro to roll out across their organization because of its ease of use, robust internal communication features, and focus on company and department culture.

 

No one at Texas Roadhouse could have predicted that 24 months after their IntranetPro deployment, THRXLive, one of the most substantial challenges in company history would arise. The COVID-19 pandemic started to spread in the US in March/ April of 2020, and Texas Roadhouse needed to lean into their Intranet like never before to weather the uncharted waters ahead.

 

In response to the crisis, Texas Roadhouse shifted its operations from 95% dine-in to 100% dine-out virtually overnight.

 

Savvy strategy, compassionate leadership, single source of truth crisis communications, and a robust change management plan empowered by IntranetPro were vital in this transformation.

IntranetPro driving change

State-by-state shifts in response to COVID-19 forced quick action, so Texas Roadhouse leaned into the tools they knew, using THRXLive extensively for their internal pandemic response. Using IntranetPro’s Featured News functionality, they quickly developed the Corona Virus Resource Center, a single source of truth paramount to connect their hundreds of locations with the Texas Roadhouse response plan. This center started as a single page but quickly grew as the different departments and support staff recognized the value of having this critical information in one easily accessible spot. The resource center lets Texas Roadhouse share up to date critical business documents:

Public health updates
Training materials
Marketing materials
WFH resources
Benefits information
Re-opening information
IntranetPro has been our single source of truth between our Support Center and our operators… a clear line of communication has proven to be invaluable as we shifted our restaurants from dine-in to a to-go model.
Amanda Norton
Amanda Norton
Communications Manager,
Texas Roadhouse
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Empowering the Roadies

With establishments across the US, Texas Roadhouse knew a one-size-fits-all response to the crisis wouldn’t work. Rapidly changing rules at the state and county level further highlighting the need for a hyper-localized reaction.

 

Texas Roadhouse’s marketing and design teams came up with a system of customizable documents to solve this issue. Over 400 design templates were created and stored on the Intranet, taking full advantage of Documenting on THRXLive. These materials let operators (know as Roadies) download and customize each to their unique needs, everything from parking lot layout, to pricing structure, to exclusive offers.

 

This combination of headquarters planning and local executions resulted in winning combinations rising to the top. First Responder Deals, Texas Roadhouse Farmer Market Days, and To-Go Grill Packs are some of the ideas that worked. More than just customers recognized their robust response; Influential selected Texas Roadhouse as one of the top-ten brands navigating the COVID-19 crisis.

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I don’t have a lot of time since I’m running a business to search out all the tools I need during this crisis. Everything I need is in one place, and I just scroll to find it. It’s updated regularly and eliminated the need for millions of emails I don’t have time to read.
Brett Crossley
Managing Partner,
Texas Roadhouse, Macon, GA
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Executive accessibility and a culture of communication

Texas Roadhouse has always been a ‘people-first company,’ and IntranetPro, along with the pandemic, highlighted how vital this aspect is.

Daily phone calls between operators and headquarters during the first six weeks of the pandemic helped Internal. Communications create fresh and actionable content for the whole organization. News Posts built from these sessions covered a wide range of topics, from how to set up dining rooms to making masks. Hundreds of comments swelled on these posts, turning them into repositories of best practices.

 

This combination of headquarters planning and local executions resulted in winning combinations rising to the top. First Responder Deals, Texas Roadhouse Farmer Market Days, and To-Go Grill Packs are some of the ideas that worked. More than just customers recognized their robust response; Influential selected Texas Roadhouse as one of the top-ten brands navigating the COVID-19 crisis.

IntranetPro key to transforming operations

  • An established source of truth
  • Engagement capabilities
  • User-friendly platform
  • Accessible from anywhere
  • Consolidated departmental information
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KentTaylor

CEO

Texas Roadhouse

 

Texas Roadhouse’s CEO Kent Taylor also joined in. Taylor donated his yearly salary to help support front-line employees and communicated this action out directly thru THRXLive. His continued usage - posting personal messages of support - is essential for employee morale and highlights how IntranetPro makes building culture and providing executive accessibility not only possible, but easy.

Analytics

IntranetPro’s Analytics engine highlighted to the Intranet owners what content their team was engaging with, even down to the individual user level. This combination of quantitative and qualitative data points helped guide further resources development and sharing across the organization.
18,801
Total Engagements | March 2020
195%
Month to Date
chart
195%
Month to Date
19,386
Total Engagements | May 2020
39%
Month to Date
chart
39%
Month to Date
Most Engaging Content
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Covid-19 / Coronavirus Update
Communities
FYI
10,650
Engagements
icon-news
We are Family!
Communities
FYI
776
Engagements
icon-news
Coronavirus Update
Communities
Roadie Round-up
644
Engagements
icon-news
Hiring Alert - Job Opportunities
Communities
FYI
509
Engagements

Internal success = external success

Markets have taken note of Texas Roadhouse’s success in managing the first months of the pandemic. When other restaurant stocks plummeted as customers decreased, Texas Roadhouse thrived.

 

With states starting to allow dine-in customers again, THRXLive is front and center of Texas Roadhouse’s plan to transition back.

 

The ‘reboot’ is being planned and guided on the Intranet, taking the best practices learned during the pandemic, and keeping those in the single reliable source of truth - IntranetPro.

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While this has been a challenging time for everyone, it has highlighted how useful our intranet is and set the communications and executive team up for success in utilizing the intranet into the future as well.
Amanda Norton
Amanda Norton
Communication Manager,
Texas Roadhouse

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