Humble Crumble “keeps improving and growing” with Deputy

Humble Crumble is the world’s first crumble bar, which does “exactly what it says on the pot: we make delicious, artisanal crumble to eat on the go or to enjoy at home”. Dedicated to bringing “Britain’s favourite dessert” to a new audience, the team has done more than just spread the crumble love. They have also reinvented crumble as an all-year-round dessert, and put a whole load of new twists on this celebrated dish. (For the uninitiated, crumble is traditionally stewed fruit like apples or rhubarb with a crunchy sweet pastry topping).

With success comes growth. And Humble Crumble soon expanded to two busy London farmers’ markets and built up an online following that led to a thriving, nationwide home-delivery business. The crumble team also covers events, selling at festivals, markets and even celebrity birthday parties.

Founder Kim Innes realised she needed to act fast to keep on top of admin for the growing team. “At first, we could track time and attendance via messaging, using it to share what the shifts were for that week or put out any updates. But as soon as our workforce increased to the point where it was no longer easy to keep track of these things, we took action.” 

As Kim points out, the last thing a fast-growing business needs is admin: “There are so many other important things to be channelling your time into when a business is young. So trying to figure out who is working or totalling up hours needs to be as simple as possible.” 

To keep staffing simple, Humble Crumble signed up for Deputy. As Kim says, “if we hadn’t, it would have been extremely difficult to manage our scheduling and there would have been a big margin for error.”

One year after signing up for Deputy, Kim feels it has really helped the business take off. “It’s been invaluable to us as we grow more and more. In the past year, we have expanded our workforce a lot and have opened new locations and Deputy has allowed us to really focus on our staff and maximise their efficiency. And it’s been so helpful when opening new sites to forecast staff and therefore predict how many new hires we need.” 

Deputy also smooths out the day-to-day running of Humble Crumble: “We’ve been able to plan who is working each day and make sure we are pairing them with staff members who have different strengths. For example, ensuring we have enough staff who are fully trained in the kitchen whilst also having fantastic front of house staff who can deliver exceptional customer experience.”

Today, with 21 staff, the Humble Crumble business uses Deputy to keep firmly focused on the future, as Kim explains: “It is such a quick and user-friendly platform that it has allowed us to spend considerably less time on workforce management. We can concentrate more closely on the one-on-one training, help staff reach their full potential and help Humble Crumble to keep improving and growing.”