How Fishbowl reimagined healthy fast food and grew to over 30 locations.

Scale with strategic tools that connect every side of your business.

Read the complete story of how Square solutions helped Fishbowl scale their business, stay connected to their team, and fulfill their mission to their community.

A trio of uni students searching for healthy food on the go.

In 2016, friends Nathan Dalah, Nic Pestalozzi and Casper Ettelson opened Fishbowl in Bondi, a fast-casual restaurant serving up Japanese-inspired salad bowls packed with delicious, ethically sourced ingredients.

In just a few years, Fishbowl has become one of Australia’s fastest growing health-food chains, with over 30 locations and 600k business transactions a year. With dreams of opening new locations in the near future, Fishbowl continues to use the Square point-of-sale system with a variety of integrated Square tools to scale their concept and make smarter business decisions.

700+

bowl combination options

600k+

transactions annually

Stress less over a POS that’s easy and intuitive to use.

As Fishbowl opened new locations across Australia, its founders needed a point-of-sale system that was fast, reliable and easy for their staff to use. Square Register’s customer-facing screen helped improve the business’ checkout flow by letting customers see exactly what they’re buying, reducing incorrect purchases. With the user-friendly Square POS, Fishbowl managers were able to get new staff up to speed quickly and reduce training time.

The need for simplicity also extended to Fishbowl’s checkout experience. In 2020, the food chain went completely cashless. The move away from cash transactions allowed their team to process payments faster, avoid bank runs for change and deliver an overall better customer experience.

Manage online and in-store orders across multiple locations.

As Fishbowl continued to scale across Australia, the founders wanted to make sure day-to-day operations flowed seamlessly. The team relies on the Square Kitchen Display System (KDS) to streamline and fulfil online and pickup orders they receive from a third-party solution. All orders are sent directly to the kitchen with detailed ticket views so the Fishbowl staff can fulfil orders accurately. Square integrates with popular delivery platforms like Mobi or Deliverect so you can meet your customers wherever they are.

Square products used

PD03761 - icon-square-kds Square KDS

Turn insights into solutions that grow your business and customer base.

Fishbowl’s commitment to locally sourced, delicious ingredients plays an important role in what they offer on their menu. To keep their menu fresh and innovative, Fishbowl trusts Square Dashboard to help them identify which bowls are the most popular by location, understand customer ordering habits and see where they can improve.

To improve workflow across multiple locations, Fishbowl uses Square Team Management to customise permission levels so employees can only access the parts of their POS and Dashboard that they need based on their role. Square Team Management also lets business owners like you see up-to-date sales data and track how many hours your team works each week.

“One of the most important things to do as you grow is not lose sight of why you’re growing. We grow because our product is great, and the experiences we create are memorable. That’s what really keeps us going.”

– Nathan Dalah
Founder & CEO, Fishbowl