January 5, 2021
2020 Year in Review
This past year sure threw us some curveballs, but as industry veterans, we forged on certain that better days would be ahead. Even with the roller coaster ride that was 2020, we celebrated our 35th anniversary and debuted a new look and website while growing our international team, adding loads of new features, and playing a role in NAFEM’s Social Purpose campaign to support our food banks in the United States.
In addition to these broader efforts, we supported the KCL community with flexible payment plans when needed. We also moved our headquarters to Orlando, Florida, but maintain a Chicago area office as well as one near Venice, Italy.
We now have a blog post dedicated to software updates, so if you miss an issue or our monthly newsletter, you can click here to see our latest improvements.
Recent updates include:
- KCL NapkinSketch and Room Builder.
- A Custom Block program that allows you to configure and place partitions.
- Custom blocks that create native Revit geometry.
- A 3D person that allows you to add perspective and demonstrate physical distance.
"We celebrated our 35th anniversary and debuted a new look/website while growing our international team.”
Foodservice Equipment Manufacturers
We added seven manufacturers to our software in 2020. These restaurant equipment product lines appear on the KCL BIM/CAD Designer (Desktop and Web), in KCL Mobile, and through KCL NapkinSketch. You can see our full list of 231 manufacturing partners here.
New Foodservice Equipment Manufacturers
Astra, manufacturer of quality espresso machines made in the USA.
B-O-F, a leading inventor, patent-holder, and designer of innovative gravity flow shelving products,
Crown, maker of steam cooking systems that are packed with technology,
Electro Freeze, an innovator in the frozen-treat equipment industry,
Espresso Soci, importer of Faema espresso equipment,
Firex, manufacturer of machines for the food and restaurant industry, and
Henkelman Vacuum Systems, maker of professional vacuum packing machines for sous vide needs and more.
Foodservice Design Updates
We update product lines as manufacturers share information with us. Watch our social media channels at the beginning of each week to see a list of manufacturers with recent updates. Don’t worry if you miss our announcements on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook, though. All updates automatically appear in your system.
Kudos to the many manufacturers who worked with us to keep their CAD, Revit, spec sheets, doc links, product specs, and images updated regularly in 2020.
We want to give a special shout-out to AyrKing, Hatco, Royal Range of California, and Structural Concepts for keeping us well-informed.
Look for weekly updates on LinkedIn and Twitter.
Education
Hundreds of subscribers maximized their KCL skills by attending Tech Tip Tuesday webinars or watching our YouTube tutorials.
We hosted 24 sessions for subscribers, in addition to quarterly updates for manufacturers. We also hosted custom sessions for industry groups including MAFSI and FCSI, as well as businesses that requested them. Contact us if you want to arrange a webinar for your team–there’s no charge.
We started Coffee with KCL as a casual virtual co-working session, a chance to see a friendly face (Kevin’s). This morphed into a brief series in which we shared tips on how to look good on Zoom, tips for the future of restaurant design with Kristine Holtz of Spring USA, and the latest ENERGY STAR programs for the foodservice industry thanks to Linnea Hofstrom.
We stayed connected while apart.
Foodservice Community
Though we missed connecting with our subscribers, manufacturing partners, and industry colleagues after the first quarter of the year, we were glad for the chance to connect at webinars and virtual meetings. Kevin was pleased to be included as a speaker or quoted as an industry leader on several occasions:
EMEA and APAC
Luca Salomoni has established game-changing strategic partnerships that integrate KCL tools with iQuote (Apice Consulting), KCAD, autodecco (Europe), and AcadSelector. These are similar to our collaboration efforts with AutoQuotes and autodecco in the United States.
This means you can design with AutoCAD and/or Revit as a stand-alone in combination with KCL. Or you can use autodecco, AcadSelector, iQuote Pro, or KCAD as design software and access KCL’s large database as your CAD/BIM model resource. KCL resources are also available for salespeople using any of the software mentioned, including AQ.
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