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Online Takeout Delivery is Back
prostoalex writes "It's like watching e-Dreams and re-living the Kozmo.com experience, only this time it's for real, the New York Times says. SeamlessWeb is here (or rather, in New York, Chicago, Washington, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Los Angeles and southern Connecticut) to take your take-out orders and deliver the food. All is done via their Web site so no need to look for that takeout menu: "SeamlessWeb charges restaurants a commission of 5 percent to 15 percent, while the business pays a 2.5 percent fee for each transaction. The process for consumers will work much the same, except they will be charged no service fee.""
2. Order Domino's pizza online at their web site.
3. Drive home and wait for pizza.
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
I've been using CampusFood.com to make my takeout (or pick-up) deliveries for quite some time. Great service. I don't think that online delivery services ever left the internet -- this story is just a shameless plug for some new startup.
I think my principles are reachin' an all time low
before the Food Network took over (bought?) the domain. Also, Waiters on Wheels. They fill a niche market.
My experience has been that ordering from a restaraunt that doesn't normally handle takeout will be a hit or miss affair as to whether or not you will be satisfied with what gets delivered.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
I've been using http://www.takeouttaxi.com/ for quite a while now.
pooptruck
Is this different than Restaurants on the Go here in Toronto? I can order online (or via the phone) from a rather large list of restaurants and have it delivered to my door. Sure, there's a delivery fee, but one might expect that.
- In hell, treason is the work of angels.
I think the point is that you can orderf rom anywhere on one site. For no extra fee!
I have mod points and I am not afraid to use them.
There's a CAD comic for every story...
= 2005-02-21
http://www.ctrlaltdel-online.com/?t=archives&date
Another blatent advertisement gets posted as a story. Yawn.
Kozmo offered video rentals online, with free delivery - as well as things like snack foods, CDs, convenience items, video games, etc. It was impulse-buying to the max. I was so sad to see Kozmo die. This is nothing like Kozmo, it's like all the other online ordering systems for restaraunts out there.
Meh. Call me when Kozmo REALLY comes back.
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What you're missing is that these guys act as a go-between for a large number of takeout restaurants. It effectively gives you up to date access to all takeout menus for all your local restaurants from one central site.
Frankly it's a brilliant idea.
It took them long enough, but they finally realized that if you hide the cost of the second business (delivery) in the prices from the first business (food) people can be fooled into thinking they are getting free delivery.
Or, another way of looking at this is that urban prices are so inflated that one can piggyback entire businesses inside the margins. I suppose when a sandwich costs $15, you've got a lot of room to play with your delivery model.
It is NOT free. They simply bury the charge in the price that you pay.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I agree that it's a brilliant idea, but the relevant question is, why will it succeed this time if it failed last time?
The most obvious answer is that the dotcom era is over. If they're offering a reasonable offer at a reasonable price, plus the economies of scale (why should every restaurant in the area have a separate delivery system when you can even out the bursts with a large central service?), it could well work.
As opposed to the dotcom era, when readily-available investor money and a land-rush attitude made for stupid promotions. A friend of mine bought stuff through kozmo because it was cheaper, even delivered, than buying the object in a store. Clearly they were losing money like crazy and he knew he was taking advantage of stupid investors.
The insensitive clots ruling the world at my employer use seamlessweb so that all the worker bees would remain at their desks as long as possible.
The system generally works very well, although the 10:30am cutoff time for lunch orders can come and go very ruthlessly leaving you without the free lunch for the day.
The few problems we've had with the service have to do more with the vendors rather than seamlessweb. Some of them, especially the new restaurants in the system, have problems fullfilling the volume of orders sometimes.
They recently revamped their user interface. The old user interface made the service look a little like someone was running it from their garage. The new one is definitely an improvement and looks very professional.
In Soviet Russia, I ruled you
I double checked, and found that I accidentally typed dominatrix.com instead of dominos.com. I was wondering why I never got any pizzas, but this weird lady kept knocking at my door.
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
SeamlessWeb is here (or rather, in New York, Chicago, Washington, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Los Angeles and southern Connecticut)
I just went to their site and it says New York only. Other cities "coming soon."
Uhhhh... great article.
Ironically, the word ironically is often used incorrectly.
It's "free" in the sense that if you actually go to the restaurant you'll pay the same price for the food. The restaurant is willing to eat the delivery charge (no pun intended) in exchange for the opportunity to do business with someone who doesn't feel like dining out, but doesn't feel like cooking, either. The delivery service charge incurred by the restaurant, OTOH, is somewhat offset by the fact that it didn't have to pay any waitstaff. My fiance used to work for our local delivery company (Dine In) and explained the process.
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
I once ordered a ninja burger, but it never came, so I guess that the delivery person committed seppuku.
All your
I've been using Quikorder for my dominos pizza (yes i have a thing for pre-made cheap pizza delivered fast =) for about 5 years now. Even has ICQ message alert, online order history, and good coupon deals.
O' for the opportunity to once again lament the loss of WebVan. I loved them. Mourn. Mourn.
But in all seriousness, just because the dot.com boom folded, doesn't mean that the idea was bad. WebVan died because it overextended itself massively, thinking it would have time to make a profit; and was caught rather unaware of the failing dot.com industry. Executive stupidity, sure, but a bad idea NO!! If they would have just kept to two primary markets during there fateful last year, they could have survived the crash, and be raking in the dough today. Many stores not offer delivery, because WebVan showed them that there was a market for it.
Also not to knock Seamless Web, but Waiter's On Wheel (Bay Area) and Waiter.com (Bay Area & Silicon Valley) both managed to survive the dot.com bust, and still deliver food from great restaurants without the super high mark-up. Up to 15% for the business charge just seems excessive; and already seems to be pushing some of their clientele into establishing their own services. The Japanese grill mentioned has a nice clean easy to use web site. Nice enough that if I knew I wanted food from them, I'd order directly from them to save both me and them money.
Of course, I admit sometimes, I used Waiter's On Wheels when I was uncertain what I wanted for dinner. Having access to a large array of menu's that aren't limited to pizza specials has its own value.