Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah it did, and restaurants actually put up stickers for it on their doors! What you're describing is what Travis Kalanick bought and have been building in LA and San Jose since last year. There are other commissary kitchens that's now doubling as virtual kitchens with half a dozen brands sharing utility, equipment and even staff. I'll do you even one better, here's the real future in less than three years: Restaura…
Honestly, if we're bringing back no-FOH restaurants, can we get automats again? I've heard stories about them from my parents and seen a re-creation of one in Agent Carter , but I'd really like to actually get to experience one.
Amazon to shut down its Amazon Restaurants business in the U.S.
111–120 of 132 posts
Re: Amazon to shut down its Amazon Restaurants business in the U.S.
#112Earlier quoted context omitted.
Cooking at home has many of the same costs beyond raw materials that a restaurant has, like kitchen infrastructure, inventory, and labour costs, driving the cost of cooking at home well beyond the raw material cost. The parent is suggesting that a business producing food at massive scale could bring the cost of preparing food much closer to the raw material cost. It is not exactly a wild idea. The model has already p…
Except you probably already have some semblance of a kitchen in your apartment. Preparing some simple meals--stir fries, steak, fish filet, etc.--has very little incremental infrastructure or skill associated with it.
That a portion of the cost of operating a kitchen at home is a sunk cost is the only thing that keeps cooking at home cost-competitive with eating out at restaurants. The price of eating at a restaurant that is well above the cost of materials is already operating at an efficiency that is above what one can achieve eating at home, all things considered.
If the hypothetical prepared meal service could deliver food for near-material cost, it would quickly start to be difficult to justify cooking at home. At least on a cost basis; there are certainly other reasons why one might want to cook at home, even if it costs substantially more money to do so.
Re: Amazon to shut down its Amazon Restaurants business in the U.S.
#113I'm amazed and amused reading some replies - it looks like some people would love to live in a world where single corporation fulfills all their basic needs: * restaurants from amazon * home real estate market[0] * shopping from amazon * entertainment from amazon * alexa from amazon, listening all the time * education (already some basic form of it exists - alexa is used to answer kids questions) Although many import…
I want someone to come in and crush entrenched rent-seekers by building and scaling better, cheaper products. There are only a handful of companies in recent memory that have managed to do that - Walmart, Vanguard, Uber/Lyft, and arguably Airbnb and Robinhood are the first few that come to mind - and I can't think of any other than Amazon that have done it in multiple spaces (CPG + IaaS so far).
I'd prefer if different startups did it in each of those industries, but I can live with Amazon taking over the world if it means that health care no longer sucks and selling a home no longer costs 6% and kids in underfunded school districts get their questions answered.
Re: Amazon to shut down its Amazon Restaurants business in the U.S.
#114Earlier quoted context omitted.
Except you probably already have some semblance of a kitchen in your apartment. Preparing some simple meals--stir fries, steak, fish filet, etc.--has very little incremental infrastructure or skill associated with it.
That a portion of the cost of operating a kitchen at home is a sunk cost is the only thing that keeps cooking at home cost-competitive with eating out at restaurants. The price of eating at a restaurant that is well above the cost of materials is already operating at an efficiency that is above what one can achieve eating at home, all things considered. If the hypothetical prepared meal service could deliver food for…
Outside of a dormitory situation (and sometimes even then), how many people are seriously willing to dispense with even the most minimal kitchen (say, refrigerator, burner, toaster oven, kitchen sink, maybe microwave)? To a first approximation, no one wants to order out for an egg and a couple slides of toast in the morning.
So most probably can't/don't want to eliminate the kitchen entirely and that minimal kitchen is probably not that different from a lot of urban kitchens in areas like Manhattan.
Re: Amazon to shut down its Amazon Restaurants business in the U.S.
#115I'm amazed and amused reading some replies - it looks like some people would love to live in a world where single corporation fulfills all their basic needs: * restaurants from amazon * home real estate market[0] * shopping from amazon * entertainment from amazon * alexa from amazon, listening all the time * education (already some basic form of it exists - alexa is used to answer kids questions) Although many import…
I want someone to come in and crush entrenched rent-seekers by building and scaling better, cheaper products. There are only a handful of companies in recent memory that have managed to do that - Walmart, Vanguard, Uber/Lyft, and arguably Airbnb and Robinhood are the first few that come to mind - and I can't think of any other than Amazon that have done it in multiple spaces (CPG + IaaS so far). I'd prefer if differe…
You can sell your home though various portals without having to ever speak to a realtor. Walmart has innovated in a few different places but primarily logistics. Disney is not just an animation hub, they work on robotics, software, as well as psychology and other areas. I think it's easier to see when your company isn't already a behemoth. Amazon arguably has done innovation better than most, but a lot of that has been through investor money other people wouldn't have access to. Established companies have to balance the books and as they've shifted towards profitability and revenue innovation has necessarily slowed.
I think you're already seeing many of your problems getting closer to solutions. There is that natural tension though between capitalism and it's tendency towards monopoly and the government's responsibility to ensure that the market stays healthy and competitive.
Re: Amazon to shut down its Amazon Restaurants business in the U.S.
#116Earlier quoted context omitted.
> There are already many "delivery only restaurants"[1] "Delivery-only restaurant" sounds self-contradictory, a restaurant is by definition a place where you can eat. These sounds more like takeouts, or traiteurs.
'Delivery-only takeout' would also be self-contradictory, wouldn't it.
Kinda, but way closer still: you're not eating on premise, however the shop brings you food rather than having to get food from the shop.
Re: Amazon to shut down its Amazon Restaurants business in the U.S.
#117Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's expensive to have boots on the ground in every zip code. RedFin hires their own agents full time. OpenListings and Zillow refer online buyers to their affiliated agents who cut them a deal on commission in exchange for leads. You can always list a place with photos and all on Zillow or CraigsList and mention that seller will not pay an agent's commission. End of the day there's a "For Sale by Owner" sign for tho…
> But considering that in the US it's the seller who pays both agents, there are no immediate savings for potential buyers [...] This is all part of the scam, and I'm surprised more people can't see through it. Five people walk into a room at closing. There are two agents, a title agent, the seller, and the buyer. Only the buyer brings any money - so it's pretty clear who is paying. Put it another way - if the seller…
Fair enough. Those commissions do compress as the house prices climb into 7- or 8-digit ranges, and there are always discount agents. The one in my area buys billboards that promise selling the house for 3% flat.
I was hoping perhaps someone from the industry could comment on why those agents haven't overtaken the market by storm.
Re: Amazon to shut down its Amazon Restaurants business in the U.S.
#118Earlier quoted context omitted.
What rate do they charge? It looks like they provide a cash offer and then find financing so you can buy it from them. I didn't see anything about how this eliminates middle-men and egregious fees. I'm not sure though, because I got a "Oops, something went wrong" popup when I tried to use their site.
I just found their quote: > Flyhomes makes money through the commission paid by the home’s seller. This is the same lie all realtors love to throw out. "You don't pay - the seller does!". Never mind the buyer is the only person who brings money to the transaction. Unless that commission is much smaller than a traditional realtor, I hope they fail.
There are more ways to innovate than just offer the same thing for less money. You can offer more things for the same money, which is what FlyHomes is doing. That is actually the more common and more financially viable form of innovation.
Re: Amazon to shut down its Amazon Restaurants business in the U.S.
#119Amazon had a restaurant business? The funny thing is, Amazon probably could do a good delivery restaurant business. There are already many "delivery only restaurants"[1] Uber Eats encourages others to start them. But Amazon, unlike Uber, is capable of building physical infrastructure. The future of this is "food fulfillment centers", large warehouse spaces which house various specialty kitchens. Common functions, suc…
So the goal is to be like a food court, but cheaper and/or better because, due to delivery-only, the location can be cheaper, and the space can be more efficiently used (no customer seating)?
Re: Amazon to shut down its Amazon Restaurants business in the U.S.
#120Earlier quoted context omitted.
I thought about this a lot during our home buying process. Our agent, too, wasn't asked to do much... because we found the house we wanted online, and had our financing, so the agent didn't have to show us any houses or help us along in any way. She just submitted our offer and that was that. I have heard that realtors, like for instance car dealers, simply have a vested interest in middleman-ing the inventory by way…
> so the agent didn't have to show us any houses or help us along in any way. She just submitted our offer and that was that. Why didn’t you submit it yourself and save all that money?
The buyer doesn't pay the agent, both agents' commission comes from the seller. Also, the agent we ended up with was a direct recommendation from the selling agent, and we figured this would give us a little extra "boost" with her by using her friend.