(upbeat music)
- [Joanna] Every time you go through
this Hardee's Drive-through, you'll hear
- [Automated Message] Would you like to try
a peach pie for 1.59?
- Nope.
- [Automated Message] Would you like to try
a peach pie for 1.59?
- No.
- [Automated Message] Peach pie for 1.59?
- No, thank you.
- [Automated Message] Peach pie?
- No peach pie.
- [Automated Message] I have one peach pie.
- No peach pie.
That's because that's an AI chatbot
that now takes all the drive-through orders
at this Hardee's location on Kent Island, in Maryland.
Well, unless the bot needs human help.
- [Automated Message] One moment.
Let me get a team member to help you.
- [Hardee's Employee] Sorry, how may I help you?
- [Joanna] And this tech
may be coming to a restaurant near you.
Made by a company named Presto,
it's available at 350 locations in the country,
including Carl's Jr., Del Taco, and Checkers.
It even uses some of OpenAI's GPT tech.
But, how does the tech work?
And is it really taking over real jobs?
- We don't need that, right?
- I designed three challenges
and drove through this drive-through about 30 times
(energetic music)
- [Automated Message] Thank you for choosing Hardee's.
Thank you for choosing Hardee's.
- to find out how good this bot is at feeding hungry humans.
Challenge one, speech recognition.
The first thing Presto does
is use automatic speech recognition
to convert an order to text,
so the AI system can understand it.
I'd like the Big Hardee Combo
with extra ketchup and a Diet Coke.
- [Automated Message] Sure.
Would you like to make that a medium or a large?
- [Joanna] But as we all know
from speech to text on our phones,
sometimes it isn't perfect,
especially with background noise,
(car horn)
which there's typically a lot of at a drive through.
Initiate dog sounds.
Can I get the 10 piece chicken nuggets?
(dog barking)
- [Automated Message] What dipping sauce would you like?
(dog barking)
- What dipping sauces do you have?
- [Automated Message] Ranch, honey mustard, barbecue sauce,
honey-q, and hot or creamy Buffalo sauce.
- I'll do the honey mustard.
Do you like dogs?
(dog barking)
- [Automated Message] Sure.
- [Joanna] Okay, but what about,
can I get a kid's meal?
- [Automated Message] Got it.
(child crying)
- Let's do the two-piece chicken tenders.
- [Automated Message] What dipping sauce would you like?
(child crying)
- [Joanna] And for the extreme challenge.
- [Automated Message] What can we get started for you today?
(car horn)
- Can I get a Big Hardee with a Diet Coke?
(car horn)
- [Automated Message] Can you please speak louder
so that I may hear you?
(car horn)
- Just one Big Hardee with a Diet Coke, please.
- [Automated Message] One moment.
Let me get a team member to help you.
- [Joanna] Okay, I'm not even sure
a human would hear me over that.
Challenge one, pass.
Challenge two, natural language processing.
Once the system has that text prompt,
it goes to the AI brain,
what's called Presto Natural Language Understanding.
The AI interprets the prompt
and determines a follow-up response.
- [Automated Message] Would you like
to make that a medium or a large?
- Large.
- [Automated Message] Would you like to try
a peach pie for 1.59?
What drink would you like?
- Diet Coke, and no to the peach pie.
At this location,
Presto has now incorporated OpenAI's GPT into the system
to make the read back portion of the order
sound more human-like.
- [Automated Message] I have one number four,
the Big Hardee Combo
with extra ketchup, large fries and a large diet Coke.
Correct?
- [Joanna] Once the order is received,
it's transferred to the restaurant's kitchen display
so a human can make and package up the food.
For simple, straightforward orders, it works well.
Got the order right. It's fairly efficient.
And yes, there's the upsell.
- [Automated Message] Would you like to try a peach pie?
- I do not want the peach pie.
- [Automated Message] Got it.
- [Joanna] It also did quite well when I changed my order.
I'd like the Big Hardee Combo.
Actually.
- [Automated Message] Sure. Would you like medium or large?
- Sorry. Sorry.
Actually, I'd like the Superstar with cheese.
- [Automated Message] Sure thing.
- [Joanna] Unlike ChatGPT,
which is trained on a large language model,
this system is trained on a limited set of data,
including the restaurant's menu.
Can I get two spicy tuna rolls?
- [Automated Message] I'm sorry,
but that item is currently unavailable.
- You have a pepperoni pizza?
- [Automated Message] No.
- [Joanna] And it does fail at some pretty simple tasks.
Do you know how many calories there are
in the Western Bacon Cheeseburger?
- [Automated Message] One moment.
Let me get a team member to help you.
- I am allergic to gluten. Is there gluten in that?
- [Automated Message] No.
- There's definitely gluten in that bread.
Can I speak to a human?
- [Automated Message] One moment please.
Let me get someone to help you.
- Hi, I'm sorry about that. We do have a lettuce wrap.
- [Joanna] Presto said this was an error
and that any allergy questions
should trigger the bot to get a human.
Challenge two,
I'm giving it a pass, because it did get most orders right.
But yes, it needs to work on the allergy issue.
Challenge three, humanness.
One of the things I like about drive-throughs,
or I say I like about drive-throughs, is talking to a human.
What's your favorite Taylor Swift song?
What's your favorite thing on the menu?
Say "order when ready" please if you are free tonight.
- [Automated Message] Order when ready please.
- Yeah.
But 3.3 million Americans are fast food or counter workers,
making this a very human-centric job.
Do we really want AI taking this job?
Yet here at the Hardee's on this 15 mile island in Maryland,
AI hasn't taken jobs, at least not yet.
- We put Presto in to support our team.
They're currently understaffed,
as in most restaurants currently in the area.
Now that we have Presto,
our frontline personnel are more free to do other things
like drop fries, assemble orders,
tend to dining room guests,
make our hand dipped ice cream shakes.
Make sure that quality assurance
in every level is to standard.
We have no intention of cutting labor.
- [Joanna] And I was happy to hear that,
given how very nice the humans at the Hardee's were
and how unhuman like the bot was.
Okay, thank you so much.
- Have a great day.
- So, what did we learn here today?
Well, that this AI is very good
at the basics of drive through order taking.
But like most applications of AI right now,
this is a way to help humans rather than fully replace them.
A human still has to babysit this bot.
- [Hardee's Employee] So typically this is where
we would lock in and take over.
- But all I did was order the Big Hardee.
- [Hardee's Employee] Yeah.
This is what we deal with sometimes. I apologize.
- [Joanna] But of course,
this tech is only going to get better.
And more companies will give in
to making AI part of their workforce.
Just like I gave in
to the peach pie on a hundred degree day.
Some cream filling.
(energetic music)