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Stacks AI Studio / Independent Restaurants
AI for Independent Restaurants
"I feel behind on AI, and there is no chance I can catch up." If that is the sentence in your head, you are exactly who I work with. I am not selling software or theory-based advice. I run my own ten person managed services business on Claude, I know the value it adds every week, and now I help owners do the same inside independent restaurants like yours: your team trained, jobs automated, hours saved. Saying yes to starting puts you ahead of many of your competitors.
Experience, Not Theory
That is our first four automations at Stacks, across a ten person team. We took on more clients, and gross margin went from 26% to 56% in twelve months. AI was not the only driver. It was the biggest one. It also set a new standard for what my team sends out: the same bar for research, formatting, and finish on everything that leaves the building, no shortcuts.
Casey Templeton, Founder of Stacks. Nashville.
"In one week I went from a two-hour session with Casey to a brand new marketing site and firing the marketing firm I'd used for two years. If Casey wants to work with you, don't be a dummy. Just do it."
The Week
Your Week. I Know It.
Five jobs that eat the week. This is the work an automation goes after first.
Vendor invoices pile up in the office. Nobody catches the case price that moved again.
The P mix sits in the POS. The best seller and the best margin rarely match.
A one star lands on Saturday night. The response gets written Tuesday, if it gets written.
Two servers swap and the schedule breaks. The manager spends the morning texting instead of prepping.
Prime cost gets rebuilt every Sunday night. Sales and invoices get keyed in by hand, again.
Menu prices keep moving. The P mix is where you find out if yours moved enough.
Source: USDA Economic Research Service, July 2026.
The First Step
Two Sessions. Two Hours Each.
For most independent restaurants, this is the first step. Homework first, then two sessions, two hours each. In person if you are near Nashville, or over Zoom. $1,950.
For the math: one person at $25 an hour who gets two hours a week back is worth about $2,600 a year. If the first automation does that for one employee, it pays for itself with room to spare. And if after our first session you do not see a job worth automating, you pay nothing.
An automation is a repeated piece of work you teach Claude once. Your team runs it every day, you own it and tune it, and it carries the work to 80 percent so your people finish the 20 that needs their judgment.
"Casey taught me how to actually put AI to work. I generate quotes faster, my workflow is smoother, and I'm making more money because of it. One of the best investments I've made in my business."
01
Homework
Before we ever meet, you pull real examples of the work that eats your week: actual documents, actual messages, nothing cleaned up for me.
02
Session One
Two hours. We map how your restaurant actually runs, get Claude set up for your team, and train you on how to operate it.
03
Session Two
Two hours. We start building your first automations and put together the training your team needs to run Claude every day.
04
What You Leave With
Claude running for your team, your people trained on it, and one job automated and in use.
Five Automations We Could Build In Your Restaurant.
One page, no obligation. Proof of what we could build together, before we ever talk.
One email with the PDF. No newsletter, no drip campaign.
monthly quits rate in accommodation and food services.
Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, August 2026.
The data path gets written down before any automation runs, and allergen, food safety, and health code calls stay with your chef and your certified food protection manager.
The Stack
Claude Sits In The Middle.
It works with the tools you already run. It reads from your POS, your vendor invoices, your scheduling, and your books, and writes back where it can.
Start with one connection, not all of them. The first automation usually needs one export from your POS, and that is the whole first step. Once it earns its keep, the invoices come in, then the schedule, then the books. Every automation gets sharper as it goes, because Claude can finally see the whole restaurant instead of one screen at a time.
The Numbers
The Numbers Restaurant Owners Are Seeing.
That feeling of being behind is not in your head. Independent restaurants mostly have not started yet, and the ones already spending on tech say it cost them no permanent jobs.
Restaurant operators currently using AI tools
Source: National Restaurant Association, April 2026.
Say tech cut no permanent jobs
Source: National Restaurant Association, April 2026.
Questions
Questions, Answered.
I feel like I am already behind on AI. Is it too late?
No, and you are not as far behind as you think. The owners who feel furthest behind often move fastest once they start, because they have not spent a year on tools that did not stick. You do not need a strategy, a budget cycle, or a technical person on staff. You need four hours and one job that is costing you time every week. That is the whole first step.
Will this replace my staff?
No, and that is the whole design. An automation carries a job to 80 percent quickly and your manager takes the final 20 percent over the finish line. Efficiency goes up for everyone, the restaurant grows without the headcount it used to need, margins grow with it, and your people spend their time on guests and food instead of typing.
Will it work with the software we already run?
Usually, whether that is Toast, Square, Clover, or Lightspeed. Some systems give me an API, some give me a nightly export, and a few give me nothing but a screen to copy from. I tell you which one you have before I scope anything.
Does any of this touch food safety?
No. Everything I build is admin. No automation makes an allergen call, a temperature call, or a health code judgment. Those belong to your chef and your certified food protection manager, and they stay there. I work on the paper around the food: the invoices, the numbers, the writing, and the follow up.
What happens to our guest data?
Your POS stays the system of record. Card numbers never go into an automation. Where a job can be done without guest names, I do it that way, and where it cannot, the data path is written down and you approve it first. Nothing reaches a guest or a review page until a manager reads it and sends it.
How long before we see something working?
The first automation runs in weeks, not quarters. The two sessions scope it, I build it against your real POS exports and invoices, and your team uses it while I refine it. One automation in production beats five in a plan.
Who owns what you build?
You own the automations and the documentation. They live in your account, written in plain language, so your managers can read them and change them. If you stop working with me, nothing walks out the door.
My managers are not computer people. Is that a problem?
That is who I build for. An automation is run by typing a request in plain English, the way you would brief a new hire. The hard part is written down once, by me, with your managers in the room. Nobody has to learn software to use one.
What if we get to the end and nothing is worth automating?
Then you pay nothing. If after our first session you do not see a job worth automating, the engagement ends there and there is no charge. The first session either surfaces a job worth the money or it does not, and that risk is mine, not yours.
Why $1,950?
Because the format is small on purpose. Homework, two working sessions of two hours each, and the setup work around them. For the math: one person at $25 an hour who gets two hours a week back is worth about $2,600 a year. If the first automation does that for one employee, it has paid for itself with room to spare. Every number in that sentence is yours to check.
Who You Will Be Working With
Casey Templeton.
Founder of Stacks, a ten person business in Nashville that runs on Claude. Both sessions are with him directly, and every message from this page lands in his inbox, not a queue.
Start Here
Start With A Conversation Between Two Small Business Owners.
Tell me about your restaurant. I take on two or three of these engagements a month. Every message comes to me and I answer it myself. The first conversation costs nothing.
Book A 15 Minute Call"A fear of not understanding AI had kept me from diving in. Casey's coaching changed that. It opened my eyes to a sea of possibilities and left me more confident to explore. Come open-minded, and see where your imagination takes you."
I reply to every message. No newsletter, no drip campaign.