This year, 53.9 million people are expected to order food delivery from a smartphone app.
And all trends indicate that this number will only continue to grow. Quick-service and fast-casual restaurants are on the frontlines of the food delivery movement. But there’s one thing that restaurant operators quickly learn about delivering food to customers: It’s not the same as in-person dining.
Instead of a quick walk from kitchen to table, delivered food has to stand up to longer transport and even some waiting times. Thus, certain dishes don’t travel well and can disappoint customers. And just like in-person orders, poorly-chosen delivery order options can cause food waste, long prep times, and other problems. To avoid this while providing delivery customers with the best possible dining experience, it’s important to optimize your delivery menu. In this article, we’ll examine five best practices for creating an effective delivery menu.
4 best practices for building a profitable delivery menu
Creating a profitable delivery starts with data – specifically, menu and order data, with some kitchen data thrown in for good measure. With this information to hand, you’ll be able to understand what customers are ordering and the expense and time spent in cooking each dish. This will be the basis for deciding on your delivery menu. Creating your delivery menu should follow these steps:
Analyze your dine-in menu
Start by examining your current menu. Which items will travel well? Which foods can be reheated (if necessary) without losing their quality? Think about foods that can be prepared quickly and that won’t require expensive or complicated packaging.
Next, look at your order data. Which items are already popular to-go or delivery items? Items that are quick to prepare, easy to package, and already popular outside of the dining room make a great starting point for a delivery menu.
Customize your delivery menu
Maybe you don’t have a lot of delivery-ready favorites, or maybe very few of your current dishes are good travelers. Don’t think that you have to make everything on your standard menu a delivery item. Can you make delivery-friendly versions of in-house items – e.g. turning higher-end dishes into tacos or sandwiches?
On the other hand, you may have lots of delivery-ready foods. Consult your analytics tools and find out if there are any ordering patterns among delivery orders. For example, if you notice that many customers order burgers, fries, and a drink together, make this a combo meal. This will simplify customers’ ordering process and also lead to bigger order values.
Finally, consider creating special delivery-only items, such as entire family-style meals. This can make your delivery menu feel fresh and special, attracting customers who are looking for something different.
Choose your packaging
There are multiple packaging options available, and we don’t need to drill down into the pros and cons of each one here. The type of packaging you choose will vary by item – soups are necessarily packaged very differently than, say, fries or burritos – but it will also depend on the personality of your brand.
Your first requirement is, of course, packaging that will keep food the freshest and least prone to shifts and leaks. After that, you’ll also want to consider the appearance and materials used in the packaging. If your clientele is drawn to a more premium experience, they’ll expect something slightly fancier in terms of packaging and presentation. If your brand aims for sustainability, choose eco-friendly packaging options. And price is also a consideration; packaging costs can quickly add up.
Add a dash of data analytics
Finally, use your data analytics tools to analyze the performance of your delivery menu. Adjust your menu occasionally, monitoring delivery times and customer reviews to find any areas for improvement. Such reviews can give you insight into the performance of your packaging and the quality of the food items delivered to your customers.
A customized delivery menu is a profitable delivery menu
If you want to win at order delivery, a carefully-crafted delivery menu is your secret sauce. By curating the menu to include dishes that travel well, you provide a better experience to your customers. And by including special delivery-only offerings, you add a sense of excitement and novelty to delivery dining.
Following the above tips will help you optimize your delivery services. But to get the full benefit, you need to lean on your data. Contact Tillster if you’d like help in getting the most from your restaurant’s data.
