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Our restaurants are failing. Why should food delivery apps thrive?

latimes.com

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Re: Our restaurants are failing. Why should food delivery apps thrive?

#191

Post by yoleg »

The problem is that these delivery apps are trying to scale a business on top of a product that already has thin margins. They're trying to squeeze in between the restaurants and consumer and both sizes is feeling the squish.

IMO the relationship between delivery apps and restaurants could be a bit more mutually beneficial.

How this could potentially work -

1. Restaurants modernize their web presence with the help of the app company. They make it easy for consumers to order online through their website, or some sort of aggregation app, but the restaurants maintain their brand, and process payments.

2. Restaurants put out a bid to deliver an order through the delivery app and someone in the area agrees to pick it up

3. The delivery person receives the fee and perhaps a few bucks as tips upon delivery

The app company would make money through long term contracts (partnerships) with the restaurants to service their delivery needs. These types of long term partnerships could be much more valuable to both the app (tech company) and the restaurant - the app company could help the restaurant modernize and maintain their online presence which is much more valuable than pinching them with fees.

Obviously this is more challenging for both sides since it requires buy-in, long-term collaboration, etc but the other option is to not adapt and continue fighting delivery apps for tight margins.

I feel like Yelp would be in a perfect place to do this if they weren't too busy pinching restaurant owners for ad money.

Re: Our restaurants are failing. Why should food delivery apps thrive?

#192

Post by JustSomeNobody »

orev wrote: post #37

Apps are doing well because they are solving a real problem — translating restaurants’ abysmal web sites, PDF menus, and awful online ordering experiences to apps that “just work”. If restaurants put any effort at all into fixing those things, there would not be such a strong demand for apps. Obviously this is different for different restaurants, and the skill set needed to run a restaurant is vastly different from r…

A menu (pdf is just fine) and a phone number and I’m good. I am baffled what the friction is.

Re: Our restaurants are failing. Why should food delivery apps thrive?

#194

Post by acka »

MattGaiser wrote: post #56
haltingproblem wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are right, lazy is the wrong word, irrational perhaps? I have worked in commercial kitchens and have plenty of friends who run restaurants and have spend time in their operations. They regularly complain about the 30%+ they fork over to grubless. 30% is an insane fraction in a business that barely makes an accounting profit! In established restaurants, a significant fraction of the orders come from repeat custome…

> Now when I walk past restaurants, I see banners imploring folks to order from their website. I guess, one silver lining from this pandemic. Lazy is not the wrong word. They couldn't be bothered to put up that website until now. They couldn't be bothered to innovate and wanted to keep people needing to call on their phones. They slashed their own wrists with their mediocrity. This is an area where teenagers routinel…

> This is an area where teenagers routinely make money by building these kinds of websites.

... only for those websites' backend services to be breached and the customer account data to be shared on the dark nets by other teenagers, ready to rip off and scam innocent customers.

Sarcasm obviously, but designing an ecommerce site is a serious affair, not an afternoon pastime.

Re: Our restaurants are failing. Why should food delivery apps thrive?

#195

Post by crazygringo »

haltingproblem wrote: post #173
crazygringo wrote: post #74

This article is misguided, based on a false premise. Food delivery apps are not thriving, if thriving means making big profits. GrubHub's stock price isn't much different from where it was 5 years ago. UberEats isn't expected to turn a profit for another five years as they continue to lose money on every order. There are no monopolies here taking advantage of restauranteurs. There's an entire ecosystem of food delive…

Grubless charges 20-30% for just ordering and checkout. In addition restaurants have to opt-in to promotions ($10 off $15) which are then passed on to them. Delivery fees are on top of that if the restaurants choose to use Grub-less' delivery network. I dont know the breakdown but most I know use their own. Uber-eats is different.

So? That brings hundreds or thousands of customers a month to a restaurant that wouldn't otherwise go/order.

The alternative marketing+order management costs for a restaurant to generate and fulfill that demand on their own is even higher on average, or else restaurants would be using alternatives.

And there is a ton of work involved on GrubHub's part of operating/maintaining the sites/apps, handling customer service (frequently), moderating reviews, provide support to restaurants, combating fraud, marketing, and so on.

Believe me. If you could create a GrubHub/Seamless clone only charging restaurants 5% to use it and still be profitable, then competitors would have already done so.

Re: Our restaurants are failing. Why should food delivery apps thrive?

#196

Post by GarrisonPrime »

almost_usual wrote: post #189
kgantchev wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the poster used legality as the moral compass, rather, consumer choice was the moral compass. If consumers lack the moral conciousness on their day to day transactions, then how can we expect them to make the right moral choices when they vote?

What? You don’t think people give more thought to who they vote for than buying a burrito?

No, actually.

Re: Our restaurants are failing. Why should food delivery apps thrive?

#197

Post by cma »

throwaway2048 wrote: post #172
thatcat wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Continuing with that logic; the prevalence of beggars on street corners indicates that their patrons appreciate their presence in the space.

Also everyone loves customer service on airlines, the fact that it keeps getting worse is gold plated proof

Likewise long wait times on customer service phone lines is proof your time is valued the same as the company's.

Re: Our restaurants are failing. Why should food delivery apps thrive?

#198

Post by Ozzie_osman »

maxpert wrote: post #150
mhh__ wrote: post #54

> why should I'm not a huge fan of moralistic takes on business. If you're selling something dangerous then that's wrong, but it's very easy to be blinkered from a high position. If people want to buy food in a certain way I can't really blame them - arguably the same with Uber and taxis, Uber has disrupted an industry which was fairly uncompetitive and politically charged (Their prevalence indicates the customers ap…

I personally believe these businesses have lagged seriously in upgrading themselves to what was coming for them. They would have paid a certain percentage to cooks, and staff from the prices they were charging, definitely lower than they deserved (hence tipping). Nobody ever complained about them not paying enough and not buying insurance for them. Now once these delivery companies have forced their hands into paying…

> Amazon in retail space has done exact thing and nobody cares, but over here everyone sees opportunity for political point scoring.

Some people care about both.

Re: Our restaurants are failing. Why should food delivery apps thrive?

#199

Post by kerakaali »

almost_usual wrote: post #189
kgantchev wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the poster used legality as the moral compass, rather, consumer choice was the moral compass. If consumers lack the moral conciousness on their day to day transactions, then how can we expect them to make the right moral choices when they vote?

What? You don’t think people give more thought to who they vote for than buying a burrito?

Everyday I'm more inclined to believe that it's about equal. You've heard of single issue voters yes?

Re: Our restaurants are failing. Why should food delivery apps thrive?

#200

Post by m4rtink »

maxpert wrote: post #150
mhh__ wrote: post #54

> why should I'm not a huge fan of moralistic takes on business. If you're selling something dangerous then that's wrong, but it's very easy to be blinkered from a high position. If people want to buy food in a certain way I can't really blame them - arguably the same with Uber and taxis, Uber has disrupted an industry which was fairly uncompetitive and politically charged (Their prevalence indicates the customers ap…

I personally believe these businesses have lagged seriously in upgrading themselves to what was coming for them. They would have paid a certain percentage to cooks, and staff from the prices they were charging, definitely lower than they deserved (hence tipping). Nobody ever complained about them not paying enough and not buying insurance for them. Now once these delivery companies have forced their hands into paying…

Tiping and how it is used in some countries to basically subsidize staff wages is just so wrong.

For example in Japan there is no tipping and trying to do so will be considered very rude. The restaurant and its staff are professionals, they have set a price and you are paying it. They dont expect a tip for doing a good job as they simply strive to do a good job each and every time they serve guests.

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