| ▲ | baron816 21 hours ago | |
It drives me insane that the VC industry threw so much money towards delivery in so many ways (restaurant delivery, meal kits, ghost kitchens, etc), when that’s the part that matters the least. If I were to do a startup, it would be a food company that leverages drive thru. Optimize everything to maximize throughput on the drive thru by only accepting orders ahead of time (maybe even days ahead of time so that the establishment knows exactly how much food to order and prepare). The food is ready and can be dropped right into the person’s car as soon as they pull up. People are fine with driving around, especially if it’s on the way home from work or close to where they live. What they don’t like is going to the grocery story, cooking the same three basic meals they know how to cook, cleaning, and eating the same leftovers for five nights in a row. I can’t believe VCs and startup founders failed to realize the driving part was not the thing people were willing to pay a premium for at scale. They want cheap, tasty, diverse, that’s more convenient than cooking, but doesn’t need to be dropped off at their doorstep. | ||
| ▲ | Terr_ 21 hours ago | parent | next [-] | |
> so much money towards delivery in so many ways It makes more sense if you see it as emerging from a meta-strategy of: Create a national middleman platform; become monopolistic by operating at a loss; trap both sides while raising fees to extract rents. The other options you're talking about aren't mustache-twirlingly exploitative enough to appeal to those investors. It would be too easy for Local Hungry Dude and Local Eatery to have a friendly chat when picking up the food, and then cut-out the (unnecessary, unproductive) middleman for future meals. | ||
| ▲ | dolmen 19 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | |
Menu presentation, ordering, payment is also a service those companies provide. That part definitely scales. But they wanted a larger share of restaurant business. | ||
| ▲ | _sys49152 20 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | |
leverages drive thru = real estate is expensive | ||
| ▲ | mrtesthah 19 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | |
>What they don’t like is going to the grocery story, cooking the same three basic meals they know how to cook... I personally am not fine being force-fed excess salt, sugar, low-quality oils, and other ingredients over which I have no control, ultimately leading to my risk of death increasing by 50%. | ||