How Swipely Uses Data to Grow Restaurant Sales, Why Restaurants Are Investing in Mobile Payments [Infographic] + More

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From mobile ordering startup ChowNow landing big name clients to the organic food industry’s growth to a whopping $35.1 billion, these are last week’s top food tech stories. Like what you read? Feast your eyes on the full roundup here. Or better yet, sign up for our newsletter and get the latest and greatest in food tech delivered to your inbox every week.

1. Infographic of the Week: Why Restaurants Are Investing in Mobile Payments & Marketing

From restaurant chains like Starbucks and Wendy’s announcing mobile payment rollouts to smaller restaurant players getting on board with payment apps, the restaurant world is abuzz with mobile app news. A new infographic illustrates the huge opportunity for restaurants to use mobile technologies to increase sales.

2. How Payment Startup Swipely Uses Data to Help Restaurants Grow Sales

Many restaurants struggle with measuring key business drivers, like which menu items perform best or who their top 100 customers are. Founded in 2012, Swipely is providing 1,000+ restaurants with insights and data to aswner questions like these and help them better understand their customers and grow sales.

3. ChowNow Lands Celebrity Chef Thomas Keller and Google HQ as Mobile Ordering Platform Clients – PandoDaily

ChowNow has grown steadily to more than 1k merchants. The startup launched Version 2.0 of its mobile, Web, and Facebook ordering platform last week, including an entirely rebuilt API that offers more flexibility and eases the process of on-boarding new restaurant partners.

4. Spoonrocket Confirms $11M In Funding From Foundation, Expands Lunch To All Of SF – TechCrunch

Spoonrocket wants to corner the market by providing high-quality meals delivered to your door in minutes.

5. Organic Food Sales on the Rise – Time

New data shows the organic food industry grew to $35.1 billion last year. American consumers are increasingly going organic.

6. Biological Barcoding: Tracing Fruit and Fish from Farm to Fork –The Guardian

Micro-organisms are always present on the surface of our food and a good source of information about the origin of each product. Biological barcoding allows us to link the organisms we find on our foods to the geographical location of their production.

7. Instacart Launches Austin’s First One-Hour Grocery Delivery Service – Broadway World

Customers can order virtually any items carried in their neighborhood Royal Blue Grocery and H-E-B stores and have them delivered in as little as one hour.

8. The New App That Wants To Fight Your Food Waste –Prevention.com

Have more tomatoes than you know what to do with? There’s now an app for that. Enter: Ratatouille. Te free iPhone app allows people in the same geographic area (about a 12.5-mile radius) to share their extra perishables with other app users.