up and delivered by a courier who first made other drop-offs on the way. Shoppers were notified within the app when this was the case. These batched deliveries typical- ly took longer to arrive and correlat- ed with lower-quality food and a worse experience for the customer, potentially reflecting poorly on the restaurant. Per the results, the last leg of a batched delivery took more than 42 minutes to complete, on average— or more than 13 minutes longer than orders that traveled directly to the customer. That delay tended to have a neg- ative impact on the food. When a meal was part of a batch, the tem- perature was correct 77% of the time, compared to 95% of the time when the driver made no additional stops along the way. Given the prevalence of long waits and cold food, it’s perhaps no surprise that shoppers’ experience was noticeably worse when orders were batched. Overall satisfaction on those orders was 79%, 10 points less than their satisfaction with nonstop orders (89%). In theory, batching allows de- livery apps to fulfill orders more efficiently, which helps lower their costs—especially in markets with minimum hourly pay requirements for couriers. And it can be appealing to couriers because it allows them to spend more time on the road earning money. According to the Intouch Insight results, batching was fairly com- mon, though frequency differed by app. Nineteen percent of orders placed with Uber Eats were part of a batched delivery compared to 12% for DoorDash and 5% for Grubhub. A DoorDash representative said there are several factors that dictate when orders are batched, but did not go into detail. In an interview at the Skift Global Forum last year, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said the company uses artificial intelli- gence to determine when to bundle orders, according to a transcript on financial services site AlphaSense.
Our priority is to provide a great experience for the consumers, merchants and delivery partners that rely on our platform. We're constantly optimizing to bring exceptional service to users across the country."
-GRUBHUB SPOKESPERSON
It’s up to couriers to decide whether they want to accept a mul- tipart order when it is offered to them in their app. For customers, there appears to be no way to avoid it without paying extra. The add-on charges range from $1.49 for Uber Eats’ Priority delivery to $2.99 for DoorDash’s Express option. Similarly, restaurants aren’t able to opt out of being included in a batched delivery. “[Batched delivery] is not work- ing for the customer,” said Sarah Beckett, director of marketing at Intouch Insight. “But also, the oth- er element of it for the restaurant or the convenience store is, how do they protect their reputation, their brand, when some of this stuff is re- ally taken out of their control?” One solution, she said, is to in- vest in better packaging to ensure food stays fresh during trips with multiple stops. The DoorDash representative said the Intouch Insight results do not match the company’s internal data on batched orders, but de- clined to share the data because it’s proprietary. The representative added that batching is designed to get custom- ers their orders faster, especially during busy periods. Uber Eats sometimes batches orders “to help keep delivery pric- es down and improve reliability for customers, enable couriers to earn more, and prevent restaurants from
becoming too congested,” a spokes- person said. Batching can also help reduce the number of vehicles on the road, the person said. A Grubhub spokesperson said 86% of the company’s overall or- ders arrive on time, but did not pro- vide a figure for batched orders. “Our priority is to provide a great experience for the consumers, mer- chants and delivery partners that rely on our platform. We’re con- stantly optimizing to bring excep- tional service to users across the country,” the spokesperson said. The findings highlight anoth- er potential pain point in the rela- tionship between restaurants and third-party delivery providers. Though the apps have become an important revenue channel for many operators since the pandem- ic, some have complained about high delivery commissions, a lack of data on their delivery customers and a loss of control once an order leaves their store. At the same time, many have said they feel they have no choice but to use the apps because they have become a key source of sales and exposure. But the results also show that consumers are generally quite hap- py with the third-party delivery ex- perience. Shoppers’ overall satisfac- tion with restaurant delivery across all three apps was 91%, a 4-point improvement from 2022, when In- touch Insight last measured it.
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OCTOBER 2024 RESTAURANT BUSINESS
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