Emergency Response
Lead with PACE. Assess the situation, coordinate your team, care for people, and determine the next steps.
Protect people first. PACE never delays calling 911, evacuation, sheltering, or urgent care.
“Pause” means briefly orient and assess — not waiting to take protective action.
Protect people first. PACE never delays calling 911, evacuation, sheltering, or urgent care.
Evacuation, sheltering, emergency calls, and accounting for people never wait for ordering shutdown, fulfillment, offer cards, or staffing decisions.
Continue assessing food safety and protecting product throughout the incident.
Identify affected systems and record outage start time. Assess food holding and contact facilities.
P — Pause and assess: Identify what happened, who is at risk, which systems are affected, and whether safe operations can continue.
A — Assign responsibilities: Assign leaders, communicate clear expectations, and take action. Pause affected order channels and manage safe departures or sheltering as the situation requires.
Assign each area, explain the expectations, and have each leader confirm their responsibilities. Equip guest-facing leaders with digital offer cards when safe and appropriate.
Checking a box records completion; it does not actually disable ordering.
C — Care for people: Take care of guests and team members. Coordinate existing orders when safe, address guest recovery, and provide appropriate assistance.
Fulfill accepted orders only while conditions are safe. Assign clear ownership of production, bagging, and the drive-through window.
E — Evaluate next steps: Protect product, assess restoration timing, plan staffing, and determine readiness to resume service.
For a closure, use this step once existing customers have been taken care of and guests have safely left the building. If sheltering is required, people remain sheltered until conditions permit departure. For limited operations, adapt this step to restoring normal service.