We need to redesign the food takeout/delivery system, this is stupid

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Written by somebody who has no idea how tiny the margins are in the food service industry. Takeout is now the only way restaurants can survive. This is particularly true during "Dry January" when nobody is having drinks. You can thank the cannabis industry and whatever force is behind the war on low to moderate alcohol use for the eventual demise of the restaurant industry. I predict that within 5 years we will have very few restaurants left to enjoy.

I’m Happy to do my part! I always order drinks when I go out. I wouldn’t go out if I couldn’t drink. No point.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I sort of agree but some of this sorting happens naturally. I don't order takeout from expensive high end restaurants. I don't want to pay that price for something I'm eating at home.

Agree there is some overlap and there is def a tier of restaurant that's getting both in person and takeout business.

Some of it happens naturally but some doesn't. I think especially in cities, there is tons of overlap and you see a lot of popular restaurants, including higher end ones, that are conducting a large scale delivery business through their host station. I live in DC, and I still see tons of delivery drivers and takeout bags at places like St. Anselm, Red Hen, Ted's Bulletin, etc. It can vary in how annoying it is to deal with as a customer -- sometimes I barely notice even though it's going on and other times it's noticeably frustrating. I think I notice it more in the winter and I suspect that's because people order out more in bad weather, and because the delivery drivers may be more pressed/annoying when they are trying to both meet higher demand plus dealing with bad weather themselves.

I think in suburbs this might matter less because there is more parking and restaurants are more likely to be in shopping centers or places that are more conducive to parking, plus the restaurants themselves can be physically larger and it may be easier to accommodate the delivery orders. I would also bet people in cities are more likely to order delivery because they don't cook as much, may have a smaller kitchen, may be young and working long hours and not care to prepare their own meals, etc. Suburbs have more families and older people and homes are larger so cooking at home is easier and more normalized.

[Anonymous]

OP. You’d be better off instacart pot pies. That’s the direction your proposal would eventually lead to. They’d move from commercial kitchen to frozen meals. All the nuance and human flair would leave.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ghost kitchens were a big thing post pandemic but they don’t seem to be working out. For example, Bethesda had a ghost kitchen for like three different restaurants at one point but it went out of business.

OP here and ah, I didn't realize this concept already existed -- wasn't familiar with this term. Too bad it has not been successful. I do feel that the food delivery economy has made the experience of dining out noticeably worse in the last few years. It is really frustrating when we go out to a restaurant and feel like we are a secondary to expediting delivery orders. Last night we sat in a Mexican restaurant where our food took nearly 40 minutes to arrive, but watched as dozens of delivery orders came out of the kitchen into the hands of drivers waiting at the front. Perhaps an incorrect assumption, but it really seemed like we would never have waited so long if the kitchen had been focused on the dine-in customers (or maybe just dine in and carry out since at least those are actual customers coming in) instead of having to produce so much food for people who just ordered on an app and will never actually interact with anyone at the restaurant. It just seemed insanely inefficient.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Written by somebody who has no idea how tiny the margins are in the food service industry. Takeout is now the only way restaurants can survive. This is particularly true during "Dry January" when nobody is having drinks. You can thank the cannabis industry and whatever force is behind the war on low to moderate alcohol use for the eventual demise of the restaurant industry. I predict that within 5 years we will have very few restaurants left to enjoy.

We just need fewer restaurants. There is less demand for dining out but that doesn't mean there is no demand. We need fewer in person restaurants, but let's make them good. And we can do that by no longer having these restaurants trying to cater to both in-person customers and delivery at the same time, which greatly reduces the quality of experience for in-person customers, which only decreases demand for that experience.

I think you will also see more of the in-person restaurants only being open 4 nights a week (Thursday-Sunday) and only being open for dinner. But the commercial kitchens providing delivery could do so 7 days a week and with broader hours -- whenever there is demand for delivery.

The reduction in drinking just means restaurants need to pivot to what people do want. Do you not understand that drinking habits have evolved considerably over the history of dining out? It's not like the dining out culture of 2015 was an exact replica of the dining out culture of 1982 or 1955.

I got going to pay what food preparation as service worth. But I will overpay for my alcohol addiction to cover the food costs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sure. But people want to eat the food that reminds them of the food they ate at the restaurant. Otherwise they'd just get ready made meals available at the grocery stores.

Restaurant consortiums could work together to have the commercial kitchens replicate the dishes from the restaurants. You could have a commercial kitchen preparing dishes off the menus from actual restaurants, using the same ingredients and methods, but tailored for delivery. In a city like DC, there are often multiple popular restaurants owned by the same group -- they could consolidate those menus into one commercial kitchen tailored for takeout. The menus would likely be somewhat scaled down because not all restaurant food makes sense for delivery, and to help make it easier for the warehouse facility to prepare items off multiple menus.

Same with fast casual restaurants. They could share a kitchen making your Chipotle, Nando's, Cava and whatever. Again, to get the delivery people out of retail districts that are designed for people who are actually going into these places and eating.

Congratulations, you discovered Ghost Kitchens!

The actual problem here is that restaurants are TOO SUCCESSFUL thanks to takeout, and they need to renovate to increase kitchen size and pickup area, and shrink dining area.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sure. But people want to eat the food that reminds them of the food they ate at the restaurant. Otherwise they'd just get ready made meals available at the grocery stores.

Restaurant consortiums could work together to have the commercial kitchens replicate the dishes from the restaurants. You could have a commercial kitchen preparing dishes off the menus from actual restaurants, using the same ingredients and methods, but tailored for delivery. In a city like DC, there are often multiple popular restaurants owned by the same group -- they could consolidate those menus into one commercial kitchen tailored for takeout. The menus would likely be somewhat scaled down because not all restaurant food makes sense for delivery, and to help make it easier for the warehouse facility to prepare items off multiple menus.

Same with fast casual restaurants. They could share a kitchen making your Chipotle, Nando's, Cava and whatever. Again, to get the delivery people out of retail districts that are designed for people who are actually going into these places and eating.

I live in NYC and we have this concept. It’s called Wonder - basically a hybrid commercial kitchen/food hall concept that works with/licenses the names of restaurants and uses their recipes to serve the restaurant partner’s greatest hits for takeout. I tried it because there’s one near me and they work with a restaurant I love that won’t deliver to me because it’s too far.

It’s in no way comparable to the real thing. Not worth it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ghost kitchens were a big thing post pandemic but they don’t seem to be working out. For example, Bethesda had a ghost kitchen for like three different restaurants at one point but it went out of business.

OP here and ah, I didn't realize this concept already existed -- wasn't familiar with this term. Too bad it has not been successful. I do feel that the food delivery economy has made the experience of dining out noticeably worse in the last few years. It is really frustrating when we go out to a restaurant and feel like we are a secondary to expediting delivery orders. Last night we sat in a Mexican restaurant where our food took nearly 40 minutes to arrive, but watched as dozens of delivery orders came out of the kitchen into the hands of drivers waiting at the front. Perhaps an incorrect assumption, but it really seemed like we would never have waited so long if the kitchen had been focused on the dine-in customers (or maybe just dine in and carry out since at least those are actual customers coming in) instead of having to produce so much food for people who just ordered on an app and will never actually interact with anyone at the restaurant. It just seemed insanely inefficient.

When were the delivery orders placed?

[Anonymous]

There's a new company exactly doing this centralized kitchen idea. Not in our area yet. https://www.wonder.com

[Anonymous]

Pizza places (like a papa johns(, Chinese take-out places, and other fast-food- type places are what you describe Op. They're not set up for ambiance, comfortable seating, or leisurely dining. Just order food and be gone.

It's not a new concept.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We need to separate the takeout/delivery industry from the restaurant/dining industry. It no longer makes sense to have them operating out of the same facilities.

If this many people are going to do food delivery via these services like Door Dash and Uber Eats, there is no point in running that through a restaurant that has invested time and attention in a physical location in a retail district, with decor and ambiance designed for people dining in, and a staffing system designed to welcome people and serve them in the restaurant.

What happens is that the demand for delivery is so high that those orders get prioritized in the kitchen. The hosting and service staff wind up taking time from people in the restaurant to help expedite orders to delivery drivers. The lobby/entrance of restaurants become crowded with delivery drivers and people picking up takeout, and people dining in have to fight through that crowd to get a table. It completely undermines the experience of dining out, which is why restaurants exist.

Delivery (and perhaps also takeout) should be shifted to commercial kitchens in warehouse districts designs specifically for that purpose. You could design a commercial kitchen that efficiently prepares and packages delivery orders without having to also prepare food for in-person customers. The facility doesn't need to be in a walkable area and the facility doesn't need a dining room or to invest money in creating an inviting, pleasant atmosphere. They don't need a host, they need an expedite director who is focused on getting the food to drivers quickly and efficiently. In a warehouse district, you could create parking exclusively for drivers right outside the kitchen, with a window to make it as easy as possible for drivers to get the bags of food. You could design an app that is focused on ensuring food is ready when drivers are there and gets to customers quickly.

And then the rest of us who actually want to dine out at restaurants could enjoy the dining out experience, and people who work in restaurants could actually do what they signed up for, which is serving in person customers. And we could get all the delivery drivers out of retail districts where they double park, ride motorbikes onto sidewalks, block entrances, and just generally make it a less pleasant experience for the rest of us.

This is called a “ghost kitchen”

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/01/dining/ghost-kitchens-delivery-pandemic.html?unlocked_article_code=1.sE4.Cfvc.GUTI3J1CIy0t&smid=url-share

It seemed like it would be here to stay but they aren’t thriving anymore

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/12/business/ghost-kitchens-restaurants-pandemic.html?unlocked_article_code=1.sE4.FZZp.6K3l_qtVDiRD&smid=url-share

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We need to separate the takeout/delivery industry from the restaurant/dining industry. It no longer makes sense to have them operating out of the same facilities.

If this many people are going to do food delivery via these services like Door Dash and Uber Eats, there is no point in running that through a restaurant that has invested time and attention in a physical location in a retail district, with decor and ambiance designed for people dining in, and a staffing system designed to welcome people and serve them in the restaurant.

What happens is that the demand for delivery is so high that those orders get prioritized in the kitchen. The hosting and service staff wind up taking time from people in the restaurant to help expedite orders to delivery drivers. The lobby/entrance of restaurants become crowded with delivery drivers and people picking up takeout, and people dining in have to fight through that crowd to get a table. It completely undermines the experience of dining out, which is why restaurants exist.

Delivery (and perhaps also takeout) should be shifted to commercial kitchens in warehouse districts designs specifically for that purpose. You could design a commercial kitchen that efficiently prepares and packages delivery orders without having to also prepare food for in-person customers. The facility doesn't need to be in a walkable area and the facility doesn't need a dining room or to invest money in creating an inviting, pleasant atmosphere. They don't need a host, they need an expedite director who is focused on getting the food to drivers quickly and efficiently. In a warehouse district, you could create parking exclusively for drivers right outside the kitchen, with a window to make it as easy as possible for drivers to get the bags of food. You could design an app that is focused on ensuring food is ready when drivers are there and gets to customers quickly.

And then the rest of us who actually want to dine out at restaurants could enjoy the dining out experience, and people who work in restaurants could actually do what they signed up for, which is serving in person customers. And we could get all the delivery drivers out of retail districts where they double park, ride motorbikes onto sidewalks, block entrances, and just generally make it a less pleasant experience for the rest of us.

This is called a “ghost kitchen”

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/01/dining/ghost-kitchens-delivery-pandemic.html?unlocked_article_code=1.sE4.Cfvc.GUTI3J1CIy0t&smid=url-share

It seemed like it would be here to stay but they aren’t thriving anymore

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/12/business/ghost-kitchens-restaurants-pandemic.html?unlocked_article_code=1.sE4.FZZp.6K3l_qtVDiRD&smid=url-share

Like any outsourcing, the problem is accountability and oversight.

[Anonymous]

I never use food delivery service. The one time I did, they forgot an item, charged us for the entire order, and it was cold. When I order takeout, I go get it myself, and check right in the restaurant that it's the correct order - I've caught several mistakes that way.

The restaurant business does not respond to the same streamlining and economic bottom line as the food industry - there's a strong element of proximity and community in a restaurant, of intimacy and soft skills that just don't apply to industrial food processing and packaging. People want to experience the same dishes at home that they enjoyed at the restaurant, and making them elsewhere probably won't work.

[Anonymous]

Typical ignorant liberal comment based upon no understanding of economics: "We should do X". We should fix this" " We should change this". Note OP never says HOW because OP hasn't a clue

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Written by somebody who has no idea how tiny the margins are in the food service industry. Takeout is now the only way restaurants can survive. This is particularly true during "Dry January" when nobody is having drinks. You can thank the cannabis industry and whatever force is behind the war on low to moderate alcohol use for the eventual demise of the restaurant industry. I predict that within 5 years we will have very few restaurants left to enjoy.

There are a few restaurant owners making a killing and expanding big time.

Restuarants are running out of ghost kitchens but restaurants usually need both to survive. I don't do the deliver services. The mark up is too high.