Restaurants Hit By Virus Pandemic To Be Supported By Delivery Hero


04/02/2020



Restaurants in countries that have been hit by the coronavirus pandemic will be supported by Delivery Hero, one of the top online food delivery marketplaces of the world, by ramping up deliveries to consumers who have been forced to stay at home because of the pandemic, the company said on Thursday.
 
A number of measures were announced by Delivery Hero which included increasing the speed of onboardong of new restaurants on its platform, making more frequent payments to the restaurants to that the  cash flow of the restaurants is enhanced and providing free deliveries for those customers who reside close by to the restaurants.
 
Delivery Hero, headquartered in Berlin, currently operates its good delivery platforms in 44 countries across Europe, the Middle East, Latin America and Asia. It has tie ups with more than 500,000 restaurants in these markets.
 
“Many of these restaurants might have liquidity for one, two or three weeks of sales so they could go bankrupt very quickly,” Delivery Hero co-founder and CEO Niklas Ostberg told the media. “There will be partners who don’t make it through.”
 
The efforts of various governments in the markets where Delivery Hero operates to prevent the spread of the coronavirus pandemic has resulted in the closing down of restaurants and cafes which has prompted many of the businesses to home deliver products through online food delivery platforms such as Delivery Hero. There are also many businesses that have started their own deliveries without the help of any online platform.
 
Over the last three weeks, more than 50,000 new restaurants have been added to its platform by Delivery Hero, the company said. It added that more than 1,500 grocery stores and pharmacies have also been included on its platform as the company is trying to increase the speed of delivery and expand delivery to include other essential products as well as meals.
 
French supermarket group Carrefour and Uber Eats are set to partner up for a new delivery service that will deliver essential goods and food to residents of Paris who are currently under a lockdown, Uber Eats said. The company also plans to start similar services in Spain and Brazil.
 
Free delivery to most customers who order for food from restaurants close by to their place of delivery would be offered by it, said Delivery Hero even though it usually takes a commission on each meal ordered. It also added that that its focus was on the marketing of local restaurants to support them.
 
Last month, United States based food delivery platform GrubHub Inc annocuned trhat it would not be taking any commission fees for now of up to $100 million from independent US restaurants that have been hit by the coronavirus outbreak.
 
Ostberg said that the company had managed to enough delivery drivers in the crisis quite easily and has also implemented no-contact delivery to ensure greater safety of its customers and delivery boys from getting infected by the coronavirus.
 
“In general people are willing to work and they feel safe. We have new riders who want to be useful,” he said.
 
(Source:www.reuters.com)