Mr Yum has acquired leading hospitality Customer Relationship Management and marketing company Sprout and MyGuestlist.

The two Melbourne-based companies will combine, with Sprout’s full-time staff joining Mr Yum at its Collingwood headquarters to create a global team of more than 260 employees, who will continue building innovative tools for hospitality and entertainment venues. 

Sprout is the leading CRM and marketing platform for hospitality venues with brands including Nando’s, Shake Shack, Solotel Group and Accor Hotels using the company’s technology in thousands of locations across Australia, the UK and US. 

The company’s first product, MyGuestlist, launched 13 years ago and is included in the acquisition.

Mr Yum CEO Kim Teo says the acquisition will accelerate the company’s mission of connecting venues with their guests in meaningful and valuable ways.

“This deal is an evolution of a successful partnership between the two companies, with Sprout and MyGuestlist integrated with Mr Yum in hundreds of shared locations over the past year, including Australian Venue Co. venues and Swingers Crazy Golf venues in London,” she says.

“We’re thrilled to welcome Sprout into the Mr Yum family. They’ve built a world-class team and technology solution and we’re excited to pour fuel on the fire and dream big with the innovation that’s possible by combining our two offerings.”

Sprout co-founder Andy Marcus says combining the two companies will drive the creation of a global best-in-class growth platform for hospitality and entertainment venues.

“Together we’ll be able to rapidly scale solutions to provide venues with deeper and more seamless insights into their customers, which will enable them to provide superior and more meaningful hospitality experiences,” he says.

“Integrating our powerful and intuitive CRM into Mr Yum’s industry-leading platform will help create elegant, data-driven one-to-one conversations between venues and their guests for the first time. We are incredibly excited about what the future holds for the company.”

Teo says consumers are eager to have more personalised dining experiences and the acquisition will accelerate the development of sophisticated new products to enable hospitality operators to deliver bespoke service to their customers.

“Together, we’ll build things that have never been done in hospitality before. Our venue customers are screaming out for innovative ways to create ongoing, meaningful relationships with their guests, like being able to offer discounts or to let them know their favourite item is back on the menu,” she says.

"We're going to make a real difference in the way people experience dining. You’ll walk in the door and the host will know your name, your favourite table to sit at, the pinot noir you enjoy and that you love spicy food.

“By combining our products on a deep level, this vision will soon become a reality.”

Australian Venue Co. Chief Experience Officer Marianne Mewett says the two companies joining will create an even better experience for customers, AVC marketing and in-venue teams across the country. 

"Mr Yum is by far the best mobile ordering platform on the market and combining that with Sprout’s smart customer data and marketing automation platform makes this a very powerful combination for venues. We are obsessed with understanding our customers and this is really going to accelerate our goals around personalisation and be a formidable tool for our marketing and venue teams."

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