Client
Individual Restaurants Group
Company
Individual Restaurants Group Ltd
Industry
Leisure & Entertainment
Individual Restaurants Group is a collection of 31 restaurants founded in 1999, offering contemporary Italian and Grill dining.
The group features iconic institutions such as Piccolino, Restaurant Bar & Grill, Riva Blu, and Piccolo.
They focus on quality food, premium drinks, and exceptional hospitality, working with the finest suppliers to create exciting menus. Recently, the group was acquired by Sir Malcolm Walker, founder of the Iceland stores chain.
The Challenge
Individual Restaurants, one of the UK’s leading restaurant groups, needed to modernise their data and analytics capabilities. Reporting had historically been fragmented across multiple platforms, relying on manual processes, outsourced IT teams, and legacy SSRS reports.
Data was siloed across reservations, loyalty, and transaction systems, with no unified reporting or data governance. The business had limited visibility into key performance metrics, and previous efforts to build a centralised platform were incomplete, resulting in dependency on external providers and limited internal control.
With a growing need for accurate, trusted insights to drive operational and strategic decisions, Individual Restaurants set out to build a modern, scalable, and independent Data Platform.
Getting the Right Advice
The Data Crew partnered with Individual Restaurants to design and deliver a new end-to-end Azure Data & Analytics Platform — modernising their entire approach to data integration, warehousing, analytics, and reporting.
We proposed an architecture built on the Microsoft Azure ecosystem, including Databricks, Azure Data Factory, Azure Storage, and Power BI, with a future-proof design aligned to Microsoft Fabric adoption.
Our focus was on creating a platform that Individual Restaurants would fully own — removing vendor lock-in, enabling real-time reporting, and providing the foundation for scalable growth and analytics innovation.
Building the Data & Analytics Platform
We delivered a comprehensive solution that included:
- Azure Infrastructure Deployment: Designed and deployed secure, private Azure Landing Zones for Development, Management, and Production environments using our proven CLOUDXCELERATOR™ framework.
- Data Engineering Pipelines: Built ingestion pipelines to extract and load transactional, reservations, and loyalty data into the Azure Lakehouse using DATAXCELERATOR™ for metadata-driven ETL patterns, significantly accelerating delivery and standardising best practices.
- Lakehouse & Data Warehouse: Applied the Medallion Architecture (Bronze, Silver, Gold) for clean data management and business-ready datasets, accelerated by our DATABRICKSXCELERATOR™ to deploy a secure, scalable Azure Databricks environment.
- Kimball Enterprise Bus Matrix: Developed a full dimensional model for Individual Restaurants, linking dimensions such as Date, Time, Restaurant, Product, Employee, and Customer across transactional facts.
- Power BI Reporting: Developed a powerful suite of interactive Power BI dashboards covering sales, bookings, loyalty performance, and operational KPIs.
- Security and Governance: Implemented RBAC (Role-Based Access Control), Private Endpoints, Azure Key Vault for secrets management, and integrated monitoring.
- Training and Handover: Provided Power BI and Data Platform training, governance documentation, and operational playbooks to enable full in-house management.
The solution was delivered using agile project management, with discovery workshops, iterative sprints, and user acceptance testing to ensure alignment with evolving business requirements.
Empowering the In-House Team
The new platform was designed for self-sufficiency and scalability:
- Platform Ownership: Individual Restaurants now fully own their Azure Data & Analytics Platform — no reliance on external hosting or proprietary vendor technology.
- Ongoing Extendibility: The platform allows easy onboarding of new data sources like updated loyalty systems and booking platforms.
- In-House Capability: Training and operational enablement mean Individual Restaurants’ team can build new reports, update models, and expand analytics without external dependency.
- Data Governance: End-to-end security, monitoring, and auditing controls were embedded into the platform from day one.
We built not just a data platform — but an environment Indivisual Restaraunts can own, adapt, and expand as their needs grow.
Ongoing Support & Maintenance
Beyond initial delivery, The Data Crew provides full ongoing support and maintenance for Individual Restaurants’ Data & Analytics Platform, ensuring it continues to operate reliably, securely, and in line with evolving business needs.
Our support model includes:
- Proactive Monitoring: Automated platform health checks, pipeline monitoring, and alerting across critical services.
- Incident Management: 4-hour initial response SLA for critical incidents, with next business day resolution targets for standard service requests.
- Platform Enhancements: Regular service reviews to identify opportunities for improvement, scalability, and performance tuning.
- Change Management: Controlled updates to ETL pipelines, data models, and reporting assets following agreed change request processes.
- Security and Compliance: Ongoing updates and reviews to maintain security best practices, access controls, and compliance with GDPR and corporate policies.
- Operational Support: Assistance with report publishing, workspace management, and user training as the business grows its analytics footprint.
With The Data Crew’s dedicated support, Individual Restaurants can focus on making data-driven decisions, while we ensure the platform remains robust, secure, and future-ready.
Outcome
Individual Restaurants now have:
- A centralised, governed Azure Data Platform built on best practices.
- Real-time visibility into reservations, loyalty, and transaction data.
- A complete Power BI suite delivering interactive dashboards across operational and financial KPIs.
- Elimination of reliance on third-party IT providers for daily reporting.
- A foundation ready for future expansion, including AI, predictive analytics, and Microsoft Fabric integration.
By investing in a modern, scalable data platform, Individual Restaurants have set the stage for accelerated growth, better operational insights, and a truly data-driven culture.
Want to unlock your organisation’s full potential with a modern Azure Data Platform?
Contact The Data Crew — let’s make it happen.
