Thanks to the still-fast-growing popularity of third-party delivery providers, restaurants are finding yet another reason to build smaller restaurants as so many sales come from off-premises diners.
Hot meals being delivered from the sky are the natural end-game of this on-demand food delivery phenomenon. With this week’s news from The Wall Street Journal that UberEats plans to launch foody drones by 2021, and our own Nick Upton’s story on unmanned drone deliveries happening up in Canada, it’s clear that the uber-future is almost here—ready or not.
Grubhub, the first public company in the third-party delivery space, announced its third-quarter earnings today. The company announced earnings of 45 cents per share, beating consensus from Wall Street of 41 cents per share, a 10 percent beat. Topline revenues rose by 52 percent, driven skyward by a 40 percent increase in gross food sales. The all-important active diners metric grew by 67 percent year over year to reach 16.4 million, up from 9.8 million in the third quarter of 2017. “Daily average grubs” (DAGs) rose 37 percent year-over-year to […]
No other grocery provider even comes close to Amazon’s dominant position relative to online grocery retailing, according to a new report from Brick Meets Click’s latest consumer survey. Amazon has captured 30 percent of online grocery spending in the U.S.
With a new safety-focused program rolling out to millions of riders, drivers and delivery partners, Uber is using technology to raise the bar on safety in its European, Middle Eastern and African markets.
The new GH Lab store at the Mall of America is a partnership between Good Housekeeping and Amazon—and it’s a convincing look at the future of retail by offering a better experience both for the retailer itself and the customers who browse this carefully curated store. It’s likely no coincidence that GH Lab is sandwiched between an Apple Store and a Microsoft Store. The storefront is glassy and transparent, and the interior is akin to upscale furniture or home goods store where virtual rooms are set up—spa-like bathroom, modern kitchen […]
There are only four tables inside a Fajita Pete’s. That’s not a setup that could work for a lot of restaurants, but when dine-in orders account for less than 10 percent of sales, a handful of seats is plenty. “We don’t just sell fajitas, we sell convenience,” says Pedro “Pete” Mora, founder of Houston-based Fajita Pete’s, where the majority of sales, about 90 percent, are from catering, delivery and pick-up orders—exactly how Mora intended it. From its 1,200-square-foot restaurants, the 10 locations of Fajita Pete’s across Texas put out fresh-grilled […]
With investor cash continuing to pile into the restaurant and delivery worlds, the biggest players are outlining plans to go their own unique directions. In a recent conversation with Caviar’s Anjarae Washington, head of Caviar For Teams and its new catering-focused acquisition Zesty, she said the company is preparing to take Zesty outside of its Bay Area home turf. New to M&A parenthood, San Francisco-based Square/Caviar acquired Zesty in April of this year. Washington said the purchase included Zesty’s staff of approximately 30 team members who are now integrated into […]
The holy grail of drone delivery has always been fully automated or Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) operations where a restaurant, a retailer or even a medical practitioner can load a delivery drone without a pilot. While the technology is largely ready for BVLOS drone flights, regulators have been extremely cautious about allowing drone operators to do so. So far, there have been only a handful of waivers and limited tests around the world. But one drone operation out of Canada has just wrapped up what looks to be […]
There is a lot of attention on the point of sale when it comes to food delivery. Numerous aggregators are playing in the space and some point of sale (POS) companies are figuring out integrations of their own as well. The POS provider Qu, formerly known as Gusto, has announced a new tool that would empower restaurant operators and brands to take on delivery in-house. But the platform promises technology tools typically only seen at pure-play third-party delivery firms or companies with a massive technology budget. Qu CEO Amir Hudda, […]
