Sending Delivery Tech Back: Five Ideas for Redesigning Aggregators

Food delivery aggregators: You’re well past your expiration date. While there are a slew of challenges facing both diners and restaurants as the COVID-19 pandemic continues, one notable element often omitted from conversation are the delivery drivers who actually make these services work, but we’ll get to that in a moment.The basic issue here is the math: Restaurants already operate on margins of about 10 percent once they’ve paid for ingredients, space, and their workforce, so the 20-40 percent fees charged by third-party delivery services are an unrealistic financial burden. For businesses where delivery is just part of their operations, this loss in revenue can be attributed to marketing that drives other forms of dining (eat-in, pick up, catering). During a pandemic where online orders have more than doubled, those numbers no longer add up.

Diners, flock as they may, really can’t be held responsible for the problem (or the solution). Due to the exclusive delivery…