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Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

restaurant tech

Delivery Hero’s Tech Academy Will Promote Diversity by Teaching Coding

As of today, Delivery Hero is taking applications to its newly launched Delivery Hero Tech Academy, which aims to promote more diversity and inclusion in the tech industry through education.   

Done in partnership with the Digital Career Institute (DCI), the program will teach coding languages (Java and Python are specifically called out) to “anyone who would like to learn how to code.” While anyone may apply, Delivery Hero specifically encourages “underrepresented groups” to apply.

The program itself will take place in Berlin and last 9.5 months. Seven of those months will be spent on curriculum, while the final stretch takes the form of an internship with one of Delivery Hero’s backend tech teams. Students may get the opportunity for a permanent position at Delivery Hero following the program (though it is not a guarantee).

For now, the program is open to those based in Berlin. Since Delivery Hero is funding the entire thing, those selected to participate pay nothing. 

There’s a growing need for opportunities that teach tech skills to wider swaths of the population. The robots may not have eaten up all the jobs yet, but automation is increasingly changing the nature of work, especially in the wake of the havoc brought by the Covid-19. Some estimates from economists have found that 42 percent of the jobs lost during the pandemic are gone forever, partly because companies are replacing humans with technology to keep costs lower. 

In the food delivery industry, specifically, we’ve long wondered when robots would take over the work of couriers and drivers, and to some degree that is already happening with autonomous delivery vehicles and the digitization of the restaurant back of house.

Delivery Hero’s Tech Academy offers one potential solution to these problems by providing individuals with new skillsets. Instead of these people getting elbowed out by tech, they are instead invited to participate in the inevitable changes facing the food delivery industry. 

The application period for the Delivery Hero Tech Academy runs from now until July 15.

 

Report: Over Half of U.S. Consumers Are Comfortable Dining in Restaurants

More than half of U.S. consumers (60 percent), are comfortable with the idea of dining out at a restaurant, according to new data from tech intelligence firm Morning Consult. The new data is part of a Morning Consult series on when consumers “will return to normal activities” put on hold by the Covid-19 pandemic. 

Restaurants, of course, have weathered some of the biggest disruptions to “normal activities” of any business type over the last year. That includes full shutdowns of indoor dining (and outdoor dining, in some cases) and a lowered confidence from consumers that restaurants are safe places to eat. Morning Consult notes that in 2020, the number of consumers who said they felt safe dining out never rose past 42 percent.

The latest report’s finding that that number has jumped to 60 percent suggests more consumer confidence in the restaurant dining room. Meanwhile, 15 percent of those surveyed said they “think they’ll feel comfortable within two to three months” and 73 percent said they will be comfortable dining out in six months. 

For now, there is still at least some reservation. Comfort with dining outdoors (e.g., patio) is still much higher than comfort with indoor dining — 69 percent versus 57 percent, respectively. 

Eating in restaurants took the number seven spot on Morning Consult’s list of activities consumers are eager to try once the pandemic is under control and the economy reopened. Going on vacation, resuming a “normal routine,” and going to the movies were among the activities that clocked in ahead of restaurants. 

However, of these top seven activities, eating in restaurants has the largest share of people already partaking. Twenty-four percent of respondents already dine in restaurants, compared to 10 percent going on vacation or 6 percent going to the movies. Morning Consult notes that excitement around restaurants in particular spans generations. 

Worth thinking about for the future is how much tech will play a role in providing higher comfort levels at restaurants. For example, will QR code-based ordering/payment technology, which lessens the amount of server-to-customer interaction, actually make people feel safer? Or will technology’s job be more about making operations more efficient and accurate? For at least a while, it will do a little of both. As more consumers grow comfortable with eating out, it’s main role will likely be around efficiency of the business, rather than simply making people feel more at ease in the dining room.

TerraSlate Makes Menus for Restaurants from Military-Grade Paper

I miss going out to eat at restaurants, but one thing I do not miss is sticky food-smeared menus. But a common alternative to a laminated menu is a paper one, which inevitably gets trashed within a day or two. Thankfully, there is a solution to both of these menu options; a company called TerraSlate has developed an anti-viral menu that can be washed and used for a few years.

TerraSlate was founded in 2015, and its proprietary waterproof material was first used to create backup copies for passports and IDs while traveling. Kyle Ewing, the founder of TerraSlate, said that menus weren’t a popular application of the paper material initially. Then, a restaurant that Ewing is a regular at asked to have menus made from TerraSlate’s paper, which led Ewing to discover this application worked really well. Since then, TerraSlate now prints and supplies menus to over 50,000 restaurants throughout the US and in 52 different countries.

What makes TerraSlate’s menus different than a laminated menu is that there are no layers; the company’s menus are a solid sheet of synthetic, treeless material. The menus include a recently launched antimicrobial and anti-viral coating, which uses a very finely crushed silver, which naturally has these properties. TerraSlate’s menu can still be wiped down and put in a dishwasher, and cannot be ripped. The lifespan of the menus is several years, but Ewing said that a restaurant would likely change its menu items before the lifespan of a menu was up.

Since the start of the pandemic, many companies have opted to use digital menus to prevent the spread of germs. This is certainly a viable option, but scrolling through your phone while seated at a restaurant is not very social. Plus, holding and looking through a tangible menu is part of the restaurant experience.

TerrSlate’s menus are obviously more for restaurants that plan to serve the same thing for a long time. The menus must be printed at TerraSlate’s facility, so a restaurant does not have the ability to change its menu items on a whim.

Prices for TerraSlate menus vary, based on size and quantity. A pack of twenty-five, 13″ x 19″ menus starts at $113. TerraSlate raised a $2 million round of funding this past February, led by Clearbanc Ventures. The company is using the capital to expand its team and printing capabilities in Denver, Colorado.

2Foods Launches Plant-Based Junk Food Chain in Tokyo

Veganism and flexitarianism are on the rise in Japan. According to an article by VegNews, there are currently 1,000 vegan restaurants in Japan, compared to just 400 two years ago. To address this increase in plant-forward eating in Japan, TWO inc. officially opened the first three locations of its “healthy junk food” cafe concept 2foods.

2foods is a cafe spin-off of TWO inc.’s FoodTech Park, an experimental store where consumers can experience food tech products from all over the world. (The company described it as a food-tech version of b8ta.) Currently, FoodTech Park is hosting exhibitions from companies like OmniMeat, Next Meat, and MAAHA Chocolate. It is located right next to the 2foods flagship cafe in Shibuya, Tokyo.

The café aims to merge the two worlds of familiar and comforting junk food with better-for-you plant-based ingredients. So far, its menu includes items like plant-based chicken sandwiches, sandwiches with a donut bun, ramen, curry, chocolate brownies, a variety of beverages, and donuts. All of the items are fully vegan, and some of the ingredients have a food tech twist.

For example, the vegan chocolate brownie is made from a base of brown rice flour. However, the rice is processed in a manner that the particles are broken down at a low temperature to be extra fine and retain nutrients. This allows the flour to absorb water and hold together the ingredients like eggs would, resulting in a fluffy, moist brownie with no animal-based ingredients. The same technique is used with brown rice flour to create the cafe’s gluten-free noodles.

The 2foods cafes will co-develop menu items with emerging food tech start-ups, which can also test new products and prototypes at the cafe locations. OmniMeat (previously OmniPork) and 2foods will soon be collaborating to launch an exclusive food product. Additionally, 2foods will partner with food tech start-ups to help commercialize their new products globally and distribute them to its physical stores, online store, and to other retailers at a wholesale price.

The 2foods online store and the concept’s first three physical locations are now open in different areas of Tokyo, Japan. The company plans to launch 100-150 worldwide within the next three years.

PAR Acquires Guest Loyalty Platform Punchh for $500M

Restaurant tech provider PAR Technology Corporation announced today it has acquired guest engagement platform Punchh for $500 million in cash and shares. The deal adds loyalty and guest engagement software to PAR’s existing arsenal of restaurant tech tools, which currently includes a wide range of hardware and software products for restaurants.

Punchh has for a long time promised to “take the guesswork out of marketing” for restaurants by helping them align their sales channels and marketing campaigns with what their customers actually want. It does this by collecting data on customers and using it to dictate the types of campaigns and promotions sent out. A high-level example of this would be sending deals on plant-based meals to vegans and never sending that group offers for burgers. Punchh, however, can get considerably more granular than this. 

To date, the company has raised $68.1 million. Its platform serves over 200 brands, including Pizza Hut, Denny’s, and El Pollo Loco.

PAR’s CEO and President Savneet Singh noted in today’s press release that integrating the Punchh platform into PAR’s existing offerings will allow restaurants to access more technology via a single system, rather than “juggling disjointed vendors,” as is fairly common nowadays. 

However, this idea of gluing together siloed technologies to run a restaurant will get increasingly harder as digital orders increase and customers demand more personalization. It follows, then, that we’ll see more deals like the PAR-Punchh one in the future as companies attempt to turn themselves into “one-stop-shop” systems for the restaurant industry. Other companies, including Square and Toast, are also building out unified restaurant management systems that are made up of hardware and software controlled from one centralized point. 

OpenTable: 91 Percent of Consumers Want Off-Premises Meals After the Pandemic

Ninety-one percent of consumers surveyed by OpenTable and the James Beard Foundation said they would like restaurants to offer takeout and delivery options even after the pandemic subsides. 

The figure is from new survey data OpenTable and James Beard recently released that features responses from over 21,000 diners and almost 300 restaurant industry professionals in the U.S. and Canada. 

Other findings in the survey indicate that restaurants are willing to meet that consumer demand. Of the restaurant respondents, 76 percent said they want to continue offering off-premises meal formats like delivery and takeaway after the pandemic. 

Another 86 percent of consumers said they were “willing or somewhat willing” to order more takeout in order to support off-premises initiatives at restaurants. OpenTable noted in its blog post that, “Tangible support is meaningful, restaurateurs say: Restaurants can’t keep these programs alive without it, because they’re expensive and time-consuming to implement and maintain.”

While 91 percent is a big number, it’s not terribly jaw-dropping news in the sense that we’ve seen this shift happening for more than a year. Long before COVID-19, the National Restaurant Association predicted that the bulk of restaurant sales would come from off-premises formats by 2030. The pandemic just accelerated that timeline.

The survey data comes at the same time OpenTable has released new features to aid in the restaurant reopening process currently happening throughout the U.S. The new releases include a bundle of consumer-facing tools as well as a new hub for restaurant owners/operators, according to an email sent to The Spoon.

The consumer-facing “Back to the Table” hub includes what OpenTable is calling a “Reopening Heat Map.” Said map is a state-by-state rundown of restaurants’ reopening statuses and any restrictions. The Back to the Table hub also offers customers includes a tool that will let customers find local restaurants according to meal format (dine-in, delivery, takeout, etc.). 

For restaurants, the new At Your Service feature will launch on Thursday, April 7, and include controls for restaurants to manage capacity, access guest feedback, and tips on reopening businesses.

Brightloom’s Adam Brotman on the Vital Role of Data in Today’s Restaurant Industry

“Ordering was becoming something of a commodity,” Adam Brotman, CEO of Brightloom, told me over a recent video chat. Data, he said, is “a bigger, more interesting opportunity than just ordering, so we decided to focus on just the opportunity to design an easy to use affordable data science as a service.”

But information about customers is only one type of data restaurants need to be concerned with nowadays. In this video Brotman also talks about the overall role data will play in advancing the restaurant industry and how smaller businesses can better harness it.

You watch our full conversation below and read along via the transcript. Note that the transcript has been very lightly edited for clarity. 

The following interview is available for Spoon Plus subscribers. You can learn more about Spoon Plus here. 

iKcon Raises $20M to Expand Its Ghost Kitchen Network

Ghost kitchen provider iKcon announced over the weekend that it has raised $20 million in Series A funding. The round was led by Mohamed Yousuf Naghi Group, AlTouq Group, Derayah Ventures, B&Y Venture Partners, AbdulMohsin Al Houkair Holding Group, and Nazer Group. and brings iKcon’s total funding to date to $32 million.

Dubai-based iKcon, which was founded in 2019, says it will use the new funds to expand the company’s ghost-kitchen-as-a-service model to new markets, starting with Saudi Arabia. Currently, iKcon operates 15 cloud kitchens across the United Arab Emirates; it plans to grow that number to 50.

The iKcon model differs a little bit from many ghost kitchen operations in that it handles everything for restaurants, from staffing to cooking to actually delivering the food. In the company’s own words, it “acts as a franchisee” on behalf of the restaurant, and provides services for both brick-and-mortar brands as well as virtual ones. (Kitopi is another notable example of a ghost kitchen network using this model.)

Its proprietary tech stack is another important selling point of iKcon’s business. Part of the company’s funding will go towards further building out the technology side of the ghost kitchen, focusing specifically on those tools that can automate more processes and in doing so ensure better quality and consistency of the food as well as faster speed of order times.

Those elements are important for a ghost kitchen that’s acting as a franchisee for the restaurant. Under this model, restaurants part with a lot of control over their food and brand, since they’re not the ones actually cooking and fulfilling the orders. Being able to assure those restaurants that a high-quality, consistently good product will arrive to customers on time will be an important point for iKcon to get right as it expands into new markets.

Datassential: 10% of U.S. Restaurants Have Closed Permanently

A total of 10.2 percent of all U.S. restaurants have permanently closed since the start of the pandemic, according to new research from food industry intelligence firm Datassential.

The report finds that of the 778,807 restaurants of all types in the U.S. that were open at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, 79,438 have closed for good as of today. (The figure includes restaurants launched during the pandemic.)

Food trucks have suffered the most of any category, with 22.5 percent of them permanently shuttered. Chains with less than 501 units have also seen high rates of permanent closures, and the report finds that chains with between 51 and 100 units have see the highest closure rate (16.2 percent).

Unsurprisingly, larger QSR chains have come out of the last year with the fewest closures: 9.8 percent. Because these businesses were already set up to cater to off-premises orders like takeout and drive-thru, they were inherently better able to weather the figurative storm that shuttered dining rooms in 2020 and forced an industry-wide shift to off-premises formats. As well, large QSR brands like Chipotle or McDonald’s had the money to further invest in digital ordering tools and new(ish) formats like delivery. 

These companies are also the ones currently leading a quasi-reinvention of the fast food format. Burger King, Shake Shack, the aforementioned brands, and many others have in recent months released designs for new store formats that emphasize more drive-thru lanes, less dining room space, and more ways to automate the order and pickup process. (Conveyor belts!)

Meanwhile, the Small Business Administration will start taking applications next month for grants from the $28.6 billion Restaurant Revitalization Fund. Restaurants, bars, and other foodservice establishments that are not publicly traded and have fewer than 20 locations are eligible to apply.

Is Deliveroo’s IPO a Turning Point for Third-Party Delivery’s Labor Force?

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U.K.-based Deliveroo is the latest third-party delivery service getting ready to debut on the public market, with plans to go public in early April. As usual, the move comes with the standard buffet of controversies surrounding third-party delivery services, particularly those around pay and protections for workers actually doing the last mile of the food delivery. Unlike usual, the labor issue is actually making would-be investors think twice this time.

Six major U.K. investors, including Aberdeen Standard, BMO Global, and Aviva Investors, said last week that they will not participate in Deliveroo’s initial public market, citing working conditions for the delivery service’s couriers and drivers. 

Like DoorDash, Uber Eats, and others, Deliveroo classifies the folks doing the actual food delivery as independent contractors, and therefore isn’t required to offer minimum wage, paid time off, or paid sick leave. As we’ve written ad nauseam, this is problematic for many reasons, not the least of which is that many workers struggle to make a living wage off these delivery gigs, as evidenced by a recent report from the Bureau of Investigative Journalism that found some Deliveroo riders earn as little as £2 ($2.76 USD) per hour during a shift.

What’s turning investors off, however, is more than just an ethical issue. Some apparently see a business built on gig workers as a risky model because of the regulatory scrutiny that model is getting of late, at least in the U.K. and in Europe. Case in point: Uber recently lost a fight against the U.K. supreme court and must now classify its drivers as employees, not independent contractors. For now, that doesn’t impact the company’s Eats business, but it’s been enough to, in the words of investment forecasters, “dampen the mood” around Deliveroo’s IPO. 

Deliveroo itself admitted in its investment prospectus that having to reclassify its workers as employees would have a “material impact” on the business. Part of the reason third-party services, including Deliveroo, have been able to achieve such high valuations in the past is because their businesses are built off the idea of minimizing labor costs. Paying drivers a minimum wage and other benefits eats into those costs, and puts the idea of steady profitability further out of reach. Additionally, Deliveroo suggested having to change its worker classifications would also impact its ability to operate in certain markets. 

The chances of Deliveroo having to reclassify its workers seems high. Just Eat Takeaway.com, another major food delivery service in the U.K. and Europe, as already pledged to do away with the gig worker model. The aforementioned Uber fight with the U.K. supreme court also doesn’t bode well for Deliveroo.

What is yet to be determined is whether this will have a ripple effect across the pond. Some recent events, like California passing Prop 22 in November of last year, seem to suggest gig workers are losing the fight against third-party delivery. On the other hand, Just Eat Takeaway.com has plans to acquire U.S.-based Grubhub, which means it may eventually bring its employee-based model Stateside.

Right now there seem to be more questions than answers surrounding the fate of third-party delivery services. But as more countries and governments take a harder stance against the gig-worker model, and as more investors think twice before backing such ventures, we may finally start to see the balance of power start to shift in favor of the folks on whose backs these businesses are actually built.

Restaurant Tech ‘Round the Web

Starbucks aims to become carbon neutral with its coffee by 2030, the company said this week. The Seattle-based coffee giant says it will do this with things like precision agronomy and climate-resistant coffee plant varieties.

Yum Brands, parent company of KFC, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell, has acquired omnichannel solutions company Tictuk Technologies. Tictuk is known for its “conversational commerce,” which will allow customers to place food orders via social media, SMS, email, and many other formats. 

Restaurant Group Brinker International this week announced a Google Maps and Google Search integration for the company’s It’s Just Wings virtual brand, in a bid to further digitize the off-premises experience.

Ghost Kitchens! Fee Caps! Igloos! Tracking the Restaurant Biz’s Changes Over the Last 12 Months

For the majority of restaurants around the U.S., last week marked the one-year anniversary since stay-at-home mandates initially forced dining rooms to close down. What’s followed has been 12 months of great uncertainty, loss, and struggle. But it’s also been a time of astounding resilience and creativity, with restaurants and restaurant tech companies alike have pivoted and shape-shifted to survive the times. 

We’ve been checking in with individuals from both spheres to see where these businesses are now and what’s most useful in terms of tools and tactics as dining rooms slowly reopen and the world goes back to some version of “normal.” 

But to better appreciate how far we’ve come and how much work has gone into this industry’s survival over the last year, I’d like to pause and take a brief look back in time at some of the major stories from these last 12 months.  

March 2020

  • States across the U.S. mandate dining room shutdowns. Restaurants large and small scramble to make the overnight shift to delivery and takeout formats.
  • Restaurant tech companies start offering software and services free of charge to restaurants. Third-party delivery services like Uber Eats and Postmates waive some fees — though not without some controversies.
  • Restaurants like Canter’s Deli, Wahoo’s Fish Tacos, and Torchy’s Tacos discuss strategies for going off-premises. Some include paring down menus, prioritizing takeout meals, and going DIY when it comes to the drive-thru.

April 2020

May 2020

June 2020

  • Some restaurant chains, including Panda Express, start to launch their own in-house delivery services.
  • Restaurants get really creative with their ideas on how to safely reopen dining rooms.
  • This Latin American startup teaches us how to run a restaurant from a mobile phone. (Hint: everyone will do this in the future.)

July

August

September

October

  • The in-house delivery versus third-party delivery debate further heats up, with many encouraging restaurants to take back control of their digital orders.
  • Crave Collective and others put a fine-dining spin on the ghost kitchen and virtual restaurant concepts.

November

  • California passes Proposition 22, which lets third-party delivery services classify their couriers and drivers as independent contractors and keeps these companies from having to pay workers comp, health insurance, and other benefits.
  • Investment in back-of-house technology grows as both restaurants and restaurant tech investors realize the foreseeable future of the industry is in the kitchen, not the dining room.

January 2021

Feburary

March

Obviously this brief timeline isn’t comprehensive, since there’s no way to really capture the true scope of the last 12 months in a single newsletter. It is meant to be a snapshot only of the change and turns the industry took over the last year.

Which is where you, readers, come in. Whether you’re part of an eating establishment, tech company, or an avid foodie, we would love to hear your restaurant experiences over the last year. Drop us a line at tips@thespoon.tech.

Restaurant Tech ‘Round the Web

Nation’s Restaurant News has a new gallery showcasing stories “from the front lines” of the restaurant industry — that is, the restaurants themselves. NRN has compiled first-hand accounts of owners, managers, brand executives and others about their experiences from the last year.

Restaurant Dive has an ongoing analysis of the state of restaurants one year later across a number of U.S. cities. Available so far are in-depth looks at Los Angeles, New York City, and Seattle. More to come.

Grubstreet looks at lessons the New York City restaurant scene has learned over the last 12 months, and what comes next.