Opened in 1951, Loveless Café has become a Nashville institution. People love the café’s biscuits and fried chicken so much that they’ve been known to drive great distances to eat there.
With loyalty like that, Loveless Café doesn’t ever want to disappoint its customers — and to help make sure that doesn’t happen, the company has a security system, installed by Nashville-based ADS Security, that also protects several other businesses that have grown up around the café.
The system offers more than the traditional intrusion protection and fire alarm system functionality; it also includes temperature sensors, which alert management if the temperature in the café’s walk-in coolers or walk-in freezers goes above or below certain levels. With early notification, management can take steps to address any problems before any food preservation issues arise — making sure there will always be fried chicken and biscuits ready for customers.
A rich history
There are a lot of customers to serve. Today the 142-seat Loveless Café serves over 400,000 people a year. But it wasn’t always that way, explains Jesse Goldstein, Loveless Café manager.
Loveless Café was started by Annie Loveless “who moved to this little shack on the side of Highway 100 on the outskirts of Nashville” and “started selling fried chicken and biscuits to travelers driving between Nashville and Memphis,” comments Goldstein. “One thing led to another and turned room by room of that little home into what’s now the Loveless Café.”
For years the business also included a motel, built by Annie’s husband Lon Loveless — and although the motel closed in the early 1980s, the former motel rooms are now occupied by an assortment of shops, each operated by a separate shopkeeper. When local entrepreneur Tom Morales purchased Loveless Café several years ago, he added Loveless Barn, a large state-of-the-art facility where the company hosts private and public events. And since radio station WSM no longer does live broadcasts from the Grand Ole Opry, the Loveless Event Barn is the new venue for a weekly live WSM radio broadcast.
“With 400,000 people a year coming through our doors, we want to make sure everyone’s safe, not just our employees and our building but those who come to see us as well,” comments Goldstein.
ADS Security has provided security for Loveless Café for years. When ADS got involved with the café, the business already had an older security system in place. “ADS came in and revamped the system, started providing them with local monitoring,” observes Mary Jo Rapetti, access control and CCTV specialist and executive sales consultant for ADS Security.
When Morales subsequently purchased the Loveless Café, he was already very familiar with ADS Security, as he used the company to protect some of his other businesses. “For years we had done other venues for Tom, so we just continued with that relationship,” recalls Rapetti.
One of Morales’ decisions as the new owner was to enhance security. “Tom’s very concerned about making an environment secure for his customers, for his employees and also protecting what we in Nashville refer to as a treasure,” comments Rapetti.
Rapetti notes that Loveless Café has a lot of “irreplaceable memorabilia” — such as notes from appreciative customers, including some celebrities.
Equally critical is customer good will. Noting that Loveless Café opens for breakfast at 7:00 a.m., Rapetti says, “It would be horrible for guests who may have gone 250 or 300 miles out of their way to have an experience at The Loveless and they can’t be served because there’s been an intrusion during the night.”
Today’s system
The security system upgrade in the Loveless Café and adjoining buildings, including the Loveless Barn, was based on equipment from Honeywell/ First Alert. Morales was pleased with that choice because he already used First Alert equipment at several of his other businesses and he likes the fact that all of the keypads operate in the same manner.
The new fire system for the Café included pull stations and horn strobes, while security capabilities included perimeter and interior protection incorporating contacts on all doors, as well as motion detectors.
ADS also recommended temperature sensors for the system. “I’ve used temperature protection for a number of years at other locations and I really believe in it,” says Rapetti. “It can save customers thousands of dollars’ worth of merchandise. And when you talk about meat and today’s economy, you can very quickly talk about $100,000 that can be in a freezer.”
The café recently had an incident where its walk-in cooler was actually performing too well, and was about to freeze an entire cooler full of produce. After receiving a phone call from the ADS central station in the middle of the night, management was able to go to the café and address the issue.
The people at Loveless Café are thrilled with the system, especially the temperature sensors. Goldstein says it’s comforting to know that “if a cooler would go down, we know we have the ability to save thousands of dollars’ worth of damage by one simple phone call — that’s something that we didn’t even know existed until ADS came to us with that suggestion.”
For the Loveless Barn, ADS installed a fire alarm system that includes a Honeywell voice evacuation system, pull stations, and speaker strobes as well as strobe lights to meet requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
“In addition to that we added on cameras and a Honeywell DVR,” explains Rapetti. The video system, she says, “gives the facility an excellent record of what is going on — the manager can monitor the system from her office and there is a historical record of anything that has occurred on the premises.”
“We are really on the outskirts of Nashville,” notes Goldstein. “When we’re not open there’s not a whole lot of traffic here. So knowing that we have the ability to be monitored 24 hours a day with a central monitoring station provides real peace of mind.”
Avigilon announced the San Diego Metropolitan Transit System (SDMTS) deployed the Avigilon HD Surveillance System at several of its transit stations to assist with passenger safety, protect critical assets and comply with industry regulations.
“With its advanced video search capabilities, the Avigilon HD Surveillance System has played a key role in our ability to resolve conflicts and prevent criminal activity across our transit system,” said Larry Savoy, assistant director of security and code compliance at SDMTS.
SDMTS installed a mix of Avigilon 5 MP, 8 MP and 11 MP HD cameras to monitor platforms and parking lots at several transit stations along with several Avigilon analog video encoders to boost the performance of its existing analog-based cameras. SDMTS stores 15 days of continuous surveillance video on existing servers.
| PROJECTS in the News |
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A 1.3 megapixel IP camera from Arecont Vision, used with Windows XP Webcam software, is responsible for photo finishes at Vojvodina track and field club, a 145-year-old athletic club in Novi Sad, Serbia that was upgraded in 2004. The high-definition camera records races and helps with the identification of athletes and their finish order. The Arecont Vision AV 1300 provides a 1280x1024 pixel image using MJPEG compression and a 4-12mm varifocal zoom lens. “We needed something mobile and Arecont Vision provides the mobility required,” said Dusko Milicic, international photo finish judge at the Vojvodina club. *** The Canadian Air Transport Security Authority selected G4S as the Security Screening Contractor for the delivery of Airport Screening Services in the Pacific Region. G4S Secure Solutions (Canada) will provide services at 20 airports, including Vancouver International Airport. The five-year contract is valued at more than $400 million (CAD) over the initial five-year term. Screening services will commence in November 2011. *** eBay is using high-sensitivity detectors and other products from System Sensor in a new Tier IV-level data center in South Jordan, Utah. “The new eBay data center requires reliable and redundant fire protection,” said Boyd Ferrin, general manager for the fire protection business at Mountain Alarm, the systems integrator that handled the installation. “The unique requirements demand much more, especially in the generator rooms and four chiller plants.” eBay wanted high levels of redundancy, while using as much as 50 percent less energy than at other facilities — a goal Ferrin said was achieved by using several loops for the fire and life safety systems, which increased programming requirements. *** HID Global announced a pilot project that showcases the benefits of using NFC smartphones for opening doors at universities and other campus environments. 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All participants are using their phones for residence hall access, and some are also using them with a unique additional digital key and PIN to open individual room doors. The technology also supports over-the-air provisioning and management of digital keys, which simplifies administration of the access control system. “This project highlights the promise of taking NFC technology beyond cashless payment into new, complementary physical access control applications,” said Denis Hébert, HID Global president and chief executive officer. “With this technology, any door that’s opened with a key or Sun Card has the potential to now be opened with a phone.” In initial feedback, approximately 80 percent of ASU participants reported that using a smartphone to unlock a door is just as convenient as using their campus ID card. Nearly 90 percent said they would like to use their smartphone to open all doors on campus, HID Global reported. “When I first saw this technology used in other applications, I recognized the benefits it could bring to a university campus,” said Laura Ploughe, director of business applications and fiscal control, University Business Services, at Arizona State University. “Mobile phones are at the heart of campus life and play a major role in facilitating the students’ social connections.” “Participants are excited about using these NFC smartphones. Many have said they often leave their room without their Sun Card, but never forget their phones,” said Debra Spitler, HID Global’s vice president of HID Connect. Photo By Tom Story *** Silverton High School, Silverton, Ore., installed dozens of JVC V.Networks VN-C215E4U indoor network dome cameras and VN-C215VP4U vandal-proof outdoor dome cameras, which are monitored through JVC VR-N1600U network video recorders. Footage from the cameras helped school officials to identify two juveniles that broke into a new greenhouse structure during the construction process and stole several items. “We’ve solved everything from theft to assaults to vandalism,” said Mark Hannan, principal of Silverton High, who also uses the system to verify student tardiness. *** Magal Security Systems signed a $35.5 million contract for a turnkey project to provide a fully integrated security system covering multiple sites for the African Cup of Nations Football Championship to be held in January 2012 in West Africa. A holistic approach was adapted in which the Olympic arena is protected, rather than the gates only, with a strong emphasis on the perimeters of each site. The system will be networked and integrated into several command control centers using Magal’s Fortis physical security information management (PSIM) system. It will also include Barricade II, a fence-mounted locating sensor. *** FLIR Systems was awarded the Force Protection Omnibus contract through U.S. Army Product Manager, Force Protection Systems. The five-year contract has a maximum award value of $997 million. Under the terms of the contract, FLIR will provide integrated systems and associated products and services to support inside-the-wire and outside-the-wire integrated base defense operations. The company was one of “few” selected to support the contract, said William Sundermeier, president of FLIR Government Systems. *** The Valletta cruise ship terminal in Malta, a group of islands in the Mediterranean Sea, deployed 50 megapixel cameras from Arecont Vision to help ensure the safety of thousands of visitors to the terminal. The system was installed by Malta-based security company Alberta Group. The high-resolution of the cameras enables fewer cameras to cover larger areas, said Arecont Vision. “Arecont Vision’s 3 and 5 megapixel cameras fit perfectly into the Alberta Group’s technology-centric approach to the market,” said Karim Cassar, Alberta Group’s manager of research and training. *** Megapixel dome cameras from Hikvision are being used for object tracking by Chronopost, an express shipping company in France. Chronopost has 80 sites (74 agencies, six hubs) and 3,500 relay points across France. The company offers a next-day morning service to the whole of France and couriering to 230 countries. Hikvision mini dome cameras are allowing Hikvision’s local partner, ARGOS Technologies, to provide parcel tracking including 3-D representation of individual consignments as they move through a Chronopost logistics centre in Strasbourg. One hundred and fifty of the Hikvision cameras are being used at this centre alone. Chronopost demanded a system that would allow the company to report to its customers on the movement of every parcel in its care and it became necessary to record the position and history of parcels on a 3D dynamic schematic of the logistics centre. Megapixel dome cameras from Hikvision are being used at intervals of five meters on the Chronopost conveyor belts. The Hikvision cameras are functioning on this project with SoftNet Manager from ARGOS Technologies. This is an SQL server-based management suite for IP video with 3D schematic representations of a facility that are well suited to a logistics site such as the Chronopost distribution centre. If a package is reported lost, Chronopost can use SoftNet Manager from its NVRs to follow the package’s movement and can automatically build a high-definition composite clip of the object’s progress through the facility from arrival to pick-up, combining footage from every relevant camera. |
