Software is designed to save you time. When you compare the sophisticated, user-friendly design of Caterease to the limited tools of our competitors, the differences are striking. Compare websites; compare screenshots; compare demos. It won’t take you long to see the difference.

Look & Feel	Caterease follows the rules of other Windows programs you have used.	Others make up their own design rules.
	What this means to you: If you have ever used Microsoft Word, if you have ever used Excel, if you have ever used Outlook – you have used Caterease. Tools you already know – drop-down menus, right-click options, familiar toolbar buttons, etc. – mean that you have absolutely no learning curve to start using the program!	What this means to you: Nothing is familiar.  Most other products make up their rules as they go along, and none of them have tools you are already used to.  This means you waste hours of extra time just trying to familiarize yourself with an unfamiliar, unfriendly environment.
Data-Entry	Intuitive, user-friendly data-entry tools guide you every step of the way.	Antiquated, cumbersome design makes data-entry slow and laborious.
	What this means to you: Book events and enter data in moments!  Completely eliminate any repetitive typing with such tools as: Event Wizard Customizable Quickpick Lists Drop-Down Calendars Drop-Down Calculators Time Wizard Tools Copy Event Tool Copy Menu Tool Mapquest Interface Room Selection Wizard Site Location Database Scratch Pad	What this means to you: Not only is it complicated to book events, but most other programs use technology more than a decade old!  Some even force you to follow their process, rather than allowing you to automate your own.
Menu Selection	State-of-the-art tools allow you to create any custom event menu instantly and easily.	Structured, inflexible, unfriendly tools make menu creation very laborious.
	What this means to you: Building a menu for an event couldn’t possibly be easier.  Consider these options: Drag and drop individual or groups of items from menus to events. Optionally edit menu items on-the-fly within events. Add custom menu items with just a mouse click. Dynamically review menu items of multiple events at one time. Automatically include advanced menu item details – ingredients, packing list items, prep instructions, etc. – along with the items you retrieve. Optionally edit these advanced details on-the-fly within events. Add images of menu items to be included on event prints.	What this means to you: Building a menu is one of the most common things you do.  These rigid, cumbersome tools add much unnecessary time and effort to the event booking process.
Ingredients/Costing	Optionally include detailed ingredients and costing automatically whenever menu items are retrieved, and modify these details on-the-fly within individual events if necessary.	If it’s done at all, it’s generally a complicated affair.
	What this means to you: Much less work and more consistency for your data-entry people! Each sales representative simply grabs the menu items he or she wants, and all of the necessary information comes in automatically behind the scenes, and calculates based on the quantity of items ordered!  Then 100% cost and profit information is literally a mouse click away!	What this means to you: Not only does it take your sales reps significantly longer to enter their data, but there is much more opportunity for error and inaccuracy.  This is particularly important when you’re dealing with cost and profit.
Shift/Staff Management	Wizards and other powerful tools let you quickly manage both shifts and individual employees for each of your events.	Perhaps you can book a waiter or a bartender, and perhaps you can even generate a print to show the details.  But nothing comes close to the sophistication of Caterease.
	What this means to you: Whether you are responsible for scheduling specific employees or simply requesting two bartenders for a party, the process couldn’t be easier: Establish rules for how many bartenders, servers, etc. you need based on type of event, guest count or other criteria. Instantly retrieve both shifts and specific employees with just a couple of mouse clicks. Avoid any staff conflicts with detailed schedules for all employees. Optionally have staffing affect price or cost of events. Have shift details appear on event prints if desired. Manage shifts for any number of events from one single, user-friendly window. Instantly email details of available shifts to a group of employees with a single mouse click. Easily pass all shift and staff information to Staffmate online scheduling software through a dynamic interface.	What this means to you: More time wasted, more costly mistakes – including the risk of double-scheduling an employee, or understaffing an important event!
Banquet Room Diagramming	Advanced, single mouse click interfaces with the leading diagramming software program.	They might open the diagramming program, and then call that an interface.
	What this means to you: Once you book an event in Caterease, one single mouse click not only opens your room diagramming program but also does the following: Puts you on the default diagram for the specific room you’ve booked in your Caterease event. Chooses the specific setup style you have chosen in your Caterease event. Automatically populates that room diagram with the appropriate number of tables and chairs, based on the guest count of the party you’ve booked in Caterease. Dynamically passes all event information – client name, date, times, etc. – into your room diagramming program.	What this means to you: You do all the work.  In most cases, the only effort you’ve been saved is double-clicking an icon.  You still have to enter event information.  You still have to choose a setup style.  You still have to enter a guest count.  You still have to waste your time with repetitive data entry.
Event Prints (Contracts, Back-of House)	The revolutionary Caterease Print Designer allows you to create and modify any number of custom event prints.	You get what you get, and it looks how it looks.
	What this means to you: Not only can you make up as many contracts, invoices, back-of-house prints, etc. as you want and decide what specific details appear on those prints, but you can also control fonts, include images of your menu and control your company’s image to your customers.	What this means to you: The prints they offer are hard-coded – which means not only are you limited to the variety of prints you have at your disposal, but your company’s image is not under your control.
Email Capabilities	No one does email better than Caterease, with its user-friendly email windows that mirror familiar Microsoft Outlook tools.	Sure, they can email – but the tools are clumsy and unfamiliar, and the process is tedious and cumbersome.
	What this means to you: No learning curve with email tools that are instantly recognizable. Any event print is automatically attached in .pdf or other format. Appropriate email address defaults automatically, and others can be chosen from a custom address book. Custom merge letters can be instantly inserted as the body of the outgoing email, achieving personalized communication in an instant! History of emails sent – complete with date, time and a copy of the email body – are created with a single mouse click. Seamless integration with Outlook - all outgoing emails are automatically saved in your Outlook Sent Email box.* Any return correspondence comes right back to your regular email address. *Not available in Caterease web-based version.
Batch Emailing Capabilities	Why send emails one at a time, when you can send 50 at once - or 150?	Do an entire day's worth of work in - well, an entire day.
	What this means to you: Email an entire group of contracts (or other event print) with one mouse click. Imbed a custom merge letter as the body of the email, so each recipient’s letter looks custom-typed. Do an entire day’s worth of work in two minutes.
Reporting	Attractive, detailed reports with many customizable options.	Common reports are available in canned layouts with little or no options.
	What this means to you: Instantly access important information about your business in a variety of easy-to-read layouts.  Optionally elect to suppress various details, rearrange information or select different details to appear on the report.
Querying Tools	The most robust querying tools imaginable put literally any information instantly at your fingertips.	Nothing even comes close.
	What this means to you: Use these powerful tools to answer literally any questions you might have about your business.  For example, you can: List all events during a certain date range, having a certain theme, booked by a certain sales rep – and a host of other custom query conditions. Customize the results of your search - choosing what details to display, sorting or grouping by a particular detail, etc. – effectively creating a custom report. Print your custom report, giving it any title you want. Export your details in a variety of formats instantly. Save your custom queries for future use – so this same type of information can be a single mouse click away. Save your custom layouts for future use – so these specific details are instantly available. Generate contracts, invoices and other event prints for any and all parties simultaneously. Generate multiple prints for any and all parties simultaneously. Send an email – complete with attachments – for any and all parties simultaneously.
Zigzag Technology	Open multiple windows at any one time, zigzagging from one screen to another and back again.	Older technology and heavier resource use mean multi-tasking is out of the question.
	What this means to you: Imagine this scenario: You are working hard editing an event, when your phone rings.  One of your customers needs you to make a change to her order and email her a new contract immediately! In Caterease, you can simply open that customer’s event in a separate window, make the changes she needs and email the contract in an instant.  THEN, when you close that second (or third, or fourth!) window down, you are brought right back to where you left off – as if you never had the interruption!	What this means to you: Forget about opening multiple windows.  In most cases, every move you make is predetermined.  And cumbersome.  And redundant.
Updates	Our in-house development team offers regular updates that are packed with features and COMPLETELY FREE with an active Maintenance Plan.	Development is often contracted out, so updates are long in coming and expensive, with only a few minor enhancements.
	What this means to you: Not only do you stay on the cutting edge, but you also get hundreds of new tools that specifically address your business needs - since they’re based on requests from users just like you!	What this means to you: If the program doesn’t have it now, it probably never will.
Versions	Web-Based & Desktop	Sometimes both.  Sometimes only one.  Sometimes only the other.
	What this means to you: The same robust functionality you have in the desktop version of Caterease is available in a remote access web-based program.	What this means to you: Many web-based programs open in a web browser, which means you are limited to the functionality of that browser.  No zigzagging around the program; no dragging and dropping from one window to another.  Just static, linear, cumbersome data entry.
Vista Compatibility	Of course!  It’s been two years already …	Depends – you'd really better ask …