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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

Deliveroo Editions

Deliveroo Rescue Team to Turn Struggling Restaurants Into Delivery-Only Businesses

In a move worthy of reality TV, Deliveroo has launched a “Restaurant Rescue Team” to identify and help struggling restaurants and revive them as delivery-only businesses.

According to a blog post from Deliveroo, the so-called rescue team, set up within Deliveroo’s HQ, will look for restaurants either at risk of closing or already recently closed and offer them a place with Deliveroo Editions, the company’s ghost-kitchen program that houses delivery-only brands and restaurants.

The rescue team will use its “local knowledge and market insights” to identify those restaurants they think will perform well in an area where an Editions kitchen is located. Deliveroo said it will help these restaurants with branding, menu development, and pricing strategies as well as some extra support.

From the blog post:

For a limited period, the restaurants who enter Editions through the Rescue Team will also receive support which is not available to other restaurants on the platform, to help maximise the benefit of moving into a delivery-only kitchen. The selected restaurants will enjoy preferential commission rates, and Deliveroo will cover the costs of rent, equipment, maintenance, utilities, food safety setup and audit costs.

It all sounds a bit like those TV shows where third parties try to save restaurants, bars, and marriages, only this time it’s in real life. Deliveroo said it will first help restaurants in London, then expand to other parts of the UK.

If successful, this ghost-kitchen-as-a-savior model could spark a trend in the industry. Restaurants are going bust at record levels right now as they face increased labor costs, simultaneous labor shortages, and pressure to meet demand for new technologies, including delivery.

Ghost kitchens provide a way for restaurants to cut costs, meet demand for delivery, and even try out new concepts without struggling under the overhead of a full-service business. In this area, Deliveroo faces competition from Uber Eats, who is reported to be doing its own ghost kitchens in Europe.

The “rescue” aspect of Deliveroo’s new intitiative is in keeping with the brand’s self-proclaimed “track record of helping restaurants on the verge of closing.” The company launched a restaurant makeover competition in June to revamp struggling restaurants in the UK.

Eatsa Unveils New Features for Virtual Restaurants, Powers Deliveroo’s Food Hall

Restaurant automation company eatsa announced yesterday a new suite of products aimed specifically at virtual restaurants and delivery-only restaurant concepts. Third-party delivery service Deliveroo is the first to use the technology, at its new food hall in Singapore.

This is eatsa’s first foray into virtual restaurants, also called ghost kitchens, which are basically restaurant-grade kitchen spaces with no dining area and, most of the time, not even a pickup area. More and more restaurants are using these to offload delivery orders from the main kitchen or test out new food concepts. Some restauranteurs also use them to kickstart a brand in a cheaper, less risky way than would be with a full-service operation.

To that end, eatsa’s new tech suite is all about making the prep, pickup, and delivery of food more efficient. New software, called the Omnichannel Intelligent Queue Software, calculates the exact status of an order based on kitchen throughput. With that capability, the eatsa app can give a customer a minute-by-minute status update. For drivers, this more precise ETA helps them know exactly when to get to the restaurant to pick up the food, so it doesn’t sit for too long.

Drivers also get some directional help via the new features — literally. Eatsa’s already known for its digital status boards it has up in restaurants. A version of these will be in the virtual kitchens, along with pickup stations. Eatsa’s shelf-like surfaces that are controlled by sensors and can display the name on the order as well as branding for the third-party service delivering the order.

The first customer for eatsa’s new features is Delveroo, who just opened another Editions site, at Alice @ Mediapolis in Singapore. Customers can order delivery or pickup from the food hall, which features 10 kitchens serving Korean, Vietnamese, Greek, and Japanese food (among other types). In the case of pickup, customers order at self-service kiosks in the hall and retrieve it from one of eatsa’s cubbies, which function much the same way as the aforementioned shelf system.

Companies across the delivery chain are now involved in virtual restaurants and ghost kitchens, from companies like Kitchen United, who rents out kitchen space, to Uber Eats, who might start peddling its own restaurants and food concepts via ghost kitchens.

Eatsa has already teamed up with a few notable names over the last couple years, for traditional restaurants, including Wow Bao in Chicago and MAC’D in San Francisco. The eatsa tech’s popularity is said to be soaring, and expanding overseas and teaming up with a high-profile company like Deliveroo seems to prove that point.

It’s smart for the company to move into the virtual kitchen space, where it’s tech could help it stand out quite a bit. As CEO Tim Young told me a while back, the company’s system is designed to make restaurant operations easier and more efficient, and it’s end-to-end, which means you can roll up every step of your operation into a single system. As restaurants large and small adjust to a world where mobile order and delivery needs to be as efficient as in-house dining, an all-in-one automated platform like eatsa’s could solve several problems at once.

Food Tech News Roundup: Goodbye Seattle Straws, Corporate Catering Raises, Deliveroo Expands Editions to France

What a strange/wonderful/fireworks-filled week. With a holiday smack-dab in the middle of the Monday through Friday grind (did you read our piece on how to have a Food Tech Fourth?), we’ve been feeling the summertime hazies a little stronger than usual. How about you?

But food tech news stops for no holiday! So we’ve rounded up a few of the buzziest stories that caught our eye around the web this week. Best read while eating a popsicle.

Bye, plastic straws!

In Seattle, no more plastic straws or utensils
On July 1st Seattle’s ban on plastic straws and utensils went into effect, making it the first major U.S. city to ban the single-use plastics in foodservice in an effort to reduce their negative environmental impact. Any restaurant or coffee shop still serving up plastic utensils will be subject to a fine of up to $250. Around the world, cities and countries are working to ban plastic straws, bags, and utensils. Seattle will be our first major test case to see if these types of restrictions can hold water in the U.S.

 

Corporate catering startup HungerBox nets $4.5 million
This week Bangalore-based startup HungerBox raised $4.5 million in Series A funding led by NeoPlux and Sabre Partners. Founded in 2016, the B2B company coordinates food catering for large corporations. They plan to use their new capital to expand throughout India and further into the Southeast Asian market. Just last week two U.S. startups focused on corporate catering also raised some capital, with ezCater snagging $100 million and Hungry raising $1.5 million.

 

An Editions site in London.

Deliveroo launches Edition kitchen in Paris
On Tuesday food delivery company Deliveroo opened up their first Editions food hub in Saint-Ouen, just outside of Paris. If you didn’t know, Editions projects are essentially curated clusters of cloud (delivery only) kitchens. This is Deliveroo’s first Editions location in France and houses 12 restaurants. The Editions model has proved successful in London, where Deliveroo is based, as well as its other locations in Singapore and Australia — and it shows no signs of slowing down. (If you missed my conversation with Deliveroo’s Dan Warne at SKS Europe, you can see it here).

 

Food robots are hot

Otto changes name to Vivid Robotics, picks up $4.9 million from Vulcan

It’s always easier to change your name when you do it before you come out of stealth, and that’s exactly what Otto Vivid Robotics just did. The Seattle based robotics startup is changing its name at the same time it picks up an additional $4.9 million in funding. The new round had a total of 19 investors, with Paul Allen’s investment arm, Vulcan, acting as lead. Vivid CEO Garett Ochs explained the name change to Geekwire, “We’re going to be creating products for food, and we’re also going to be creating other things. We wanted to do rebranding so we are set up for a more streamlined approach to a divergent future.”

Just a reminder: we’ll be in Providence, Rhode Island on July 17th talking about the future of seafood at Providence Pilotworks. Join us if you are looking to get your foodtech fill and have a conversation about the future of seafood.