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How to create a food delivery app with Appy Pie AppMakr?


Abhinav Girdhar
By Abhinav Girdhar | Last Updated on May 21st, 2022 10:51 am
Food Delivery App - Appy Pie

In this post, we will talk about the concept of online food ordering, types of food delivery business models, and the features you must include in the perfect food delivery app. Apart from this, the blog also addresses the challenges in creating a food delivery app while giving you actionable business tips. The highlight of the blog is the step-by-step tutorial and a video to help you create a restaurant version and the delivery person’s version of the app for on-demand food delivery app using Appy Pie’s app builder.

 

How to create a food delivery app

 

1. Introduction

It’s a busy world and the two most treasured elements of our modern-day living are convenience and speed.

Did you know, 51% of US consumers use delivery services to purchase meals from casual dining restaurants?

Any business in the service industry must be able to offer the consumer flexibility and options, ease of use, and must be mindful of the app users’ needs. The best on-demand food delivery apps like UberEats, Deliveroo, Postmates etc. have managed to do this really well and have gone to great lengths in making sure that they deliver only the best experience for their app users.

In fact, according to Taco Bell, their mobile app and website gets orders with 20% higher value than the orders they get in-store. This is a potential and promise that modern entrepreneurs find lucrative, developers find challenging, and consumers benefit from.

The millennials are changing the concept of dining out into dining in, where they enjoy the food coming to them, instead of stepping out to eat. They want and expect their favorite restaurants to deliver at the tap of a screen and in such a scenario, food delivery apps are in great demand.

Did you know that 57% of millennials prefer to have their food delivered so that they can watch their favorite shows at home?

In the research, 31% of consumers say that they prefer using third-party apps for food delivery at least twice a week. It is these third-party apps that have the potential to change the face of the food delivery industry as consumers are getting accustomed to hunting for deals in apps of the one stop shop variety!

2. Types of Food Deliver Business Models

There are three basic business models currently known in the business of food delivery. Let us get into the details of each one of them.

2.1. Order Only Model

In this type of food delivery business model, the food delivery app acts as a platform between the customers and the restaurants. The app lets the users or customers place their orders with the restaurant of their choosing. The restaurants benefit from these platforms as they can reach out to a wider audience without having to run promotions or advertising their restaurant anywhere. The customers or the app users can then easily order from their favorite restaurant or a new restaurant they see on the platform.

The consumer can explore the menus, reviews, ratings, and prices only after registering on the app, and then place their order. After the confirmation of the order, the information is passed on to the restaurant by the aggregator and then the food is sent out for delivery. The dispatch and delivery of the food here is taken care of entirely by the restaurant itself. Apps like Grub Hub and Just Eat fall under this category.

It is easy to create an on-demand food delivery app with Appy Pie and it needs no coding.

2.2. Order & delivery model

The most popular food delivery business model adopted by restaurants, order and delivery model has three stakeholders – the restaurant, the customers, and the delivery personnel. It is essentially a marketplace solution where restaurants or food businesses of any kind can register themselves and not have to worry at all about the delivery part of the business.

This model offers a lot of ease and support to start-ups in the food industry who do not have the resources or the bandwidth to have their own delivery system in place. From a restaurant’s point of view, this model brings a horde of benefits. Adapting this model rules out the need to maintain delivery personnel, vehicles, or managing and making the deliveries. Apps like UberEATS and Door Dash fall under this category.

2.3. Fully integrated model

This is a relatively new type of food delivery business model and is great for meal delivery startups and is entirely different from the two models mentioned earlier. Here, everything is taken care of by the app owner, right from cooking to delivery.

Most of these businesses have a limited menu but offer customers the convenience of getting an entire meal prepared and delivered at their doorstep without having to worry about anything at all. These businesses have kitchens of their own or collaborate with a chef and deliver the meals hot or frozen and ready to be heated and served.

3. Features of a perfect on-demand food delivery app

So what is it that is needed to build a food delivery app like UberEats? There are a number of common features that determine the future performance and success of the app.

3.1. Access to Data

Data is the real king here as it is the one thing that attracts themost users. The more menus, cuisines, restaurants, ingredients, nutritional content, calories, delivery times, restaurant addresses they have, the more interested and engaged a user is going to be. It is this information that helps the consumers make their mind up about what they would like to order. In this day and age of technical revolution, all this information and other details can be accessed through API used in the mobile apps.

3.2. Online Payment Integration

It is not enough to be able to sit at home and place your orders, it is only natural that your users would want to make their payments online too! Whether it is UberEats or Zomato, all the leading players in this market provide this feature where users would not have to worry about having enough cash in their wallets. For an app that is truly popular among the users, it is important that you incorporate as many payment options as possible. Some fo the most preferred mediums are Stripe, Visa Checkout, Paypal, or even Square. These mediums allow the users to use debit or credit cards to complete their payment without a hitch.

3.3. Delivery Time

This is a world of instant gratification and in this fast paced world most users are looking for quick deliveries with maximum efficiency. It is therefore wise to have a feature displaying an estimated delivery time for the benefit of the user. This goes a long way in managing the expectations of a consumer and effectively reduces the consumers’ anxiety levels. While UberEats gives an estimate of the delivery time Postmates is known to be pretty accurate in the prediction of the time taken. This might seem like an impossible accomplishment, but in the age of machine learning, it isn’t too farfetched. All possible contributory parameters are taken into account and the delivery times are calculated automatically whenever an order is placed on your app.

3.4. Tracking

Even though this feature was popularized by the leading taxi app Uber but comes in really handy for the food delivery apps. GPS is being used extensively by the leading food delivery apps like Postmates and restaurant apps like Pizza Hut and Caviar to offer only the best experience to the consumers. The way GPS works here is that first it identifies the user’s location and once the user’s location is verified, there is a two way tracking and GPS functioning where the consumer can track the progress and movement of the delivery personnel and the delivery personnel would be able to see the way to the consumers’ location. Some of the great APIs for this feature include MapKit, Google Maps or Waze’s Navigation. Uber uses Google Maps on all the platforms.

3.5. Review & Ratings

The food delivery apps integrate the freelance drivers or delivery personnel who are filtered quite stringently, but they still need to be monitored from time to time to ensure that they are doing a good job and not doing anything that would malign the company’s reputation. The best and most efficient way to accomplish this is through a consumer review and ratings system. Apps like Postmates, DoorDash, UberEats offer their consumers an opportunity to provide a rating for the delivery personnel based on their experience. It is on the basis of these ratings that the apps decide whether they would continue with the delivery personnel in question.

The way a food delivery app function is completely different from your Instagram or WhatsApp. The best solution for a good food delivery app entails creating three different versions of the app according to the three different user groups on your app – the consumers who would be ordering on your app, the delivery personnel you would be hiring, and the managers from your restaurant partners.

By the year 2022, the third-party food delivery market (including restaurant meals and groceries) is all set to reach $24.5 billion.

3.6 Loyalty Program

A strong loyalty program encourages more customers to order from an online delivery service. As per recent research, 45% of consumers say that they would use online ordering services more often if they offered mobile ordering or loyalty programs. A loyalty program, while lucrative to the customers, helps restauranteurs retain more customers encouraging them to come back and order again.

4. Consumer Version Of The App


4.1. Registration

The consumer’s journey with your app begins at the signing up or registration phase. As soon as you employ the feature of creating consumer accounts you form the foundation for a deeper, more meaningful bond with them. To the consumer this offers the possibility to log in to their accounts with ease and retaining any custom setting they might have employed. Some of the most basic functions that a consumer must be able to perform here include the ability to create a username, password and link at least one card as a payment option for online payments. These functions may advance to include features like adding food preferences, profile photos, adding favourites etc. in this process one must keep the following points in mind.

  • Including social media logins through Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and more.
  • Keeping the registration process crisp and efficient


4.2. Looking For A Restaurant

This is the data that you are going to offer to your consumers after they have registered with you. They are now going to look for what they are going to eat and from where they are going to order it. This essentially means that the following two features assume great importance

  • Locating restaurants in the vicinity
  • Gaining access to information about the restaurant including the restaurant’s cuisine, prices, deals, discounts, and reviews.

In order to enhance the UX, it is a good idea to pay attention to the search feature which might enable the search either by restaurant name, locality, or by the names of specific dishes.

4.3. Placing An Order

Now that your consumer has found something that they like, it’s time for them to order. Here, the user must have the ability and freedom to be able to add, remove or edit their chosen dishes to and from their cart. The consumer should be offered a summary of their order before they confirm the order to give them an option to cancel an order if something goes unexpectedly wrong. One added feature that we recommend here is to offer the consumers an option to either get the order delivered to the specified location or pick it up.

4.4. Paying For The Order

This might be favourite for you and the restaurant partner, but not really something that a consumer looks forward to. The most crucial aspect here is safety with speed and ease. The more options you offer for payment, the more consumers you would invite to your fold, hence add as many as you can think of.

4.5. Setting The Location & Tracking The Order

Now that the payment is done, the consumer is looking forward to their favourite meal, whether they are relaxing at home, busy at work or are sunbathing at the local park. Setting the right drop location is a necessary feature which needs your attention and when you provide the advanced feature of tracking the order in real time, you are offering a relief from the anxiety of waiting and guessing how long the delivery would take!

4.6. Rating & Reviewing

So the consumer has now received their order. What now? Eat, of course and then letting everyone know how your experience was, through a 5 star rating or a detailed review. Empower the consumers with an ability to rate the restaurant, the dish, and the delivery personnel. Did they have to wait for too long, was the delivery guy rude, or the dish too salty? Let them write it out.

4.7. Features To Enhance The Version

The features mentioned above are an absolute necessity when it comes to building your very own food delivery app, but there are some advanced features that may take your entire UX quite a few notches up! Some of our suggestions include:

  • Creating a wish list
  • Social media logins
  • Order history
  • Estimated delivery times

5. Delivery Personnel Version Of The App


5.1. Registration & Making A Profile

The delivery personnel need to first identify themselves and for that they have to register on their version of the app just like a consumer would have to. This registration may either be done through mobile number, email address or a social media account in addition to filling out some critical information. At this stage it is important to provide an option of password recovery option as well.

5.2. Managing The Orders

Once the delivery personnel have registered themselves, they need to have access to all relevant data about the size of the order, the pickup and drop locations, and any other specifications. This feature of the app must allow the delivery professional to approve or disapprove the delivery request by booking or rejecting it.

5.3. Updating The Status

This feature allows the delivery personnel to update their status so that the waiting consumer gets notification about the status of the order. There are three possible status that may be updated by the delivery personnel including:

  • Approved/Disapproved
  • Order Picked
  • Order Completed/Delivered

Once the order has been delivered by the delivery personnel, and the consumer has confirmed the delivery of food, the payment is disbursed to the delivery personnel’s account or through cash. This completes the whole chain of ordering.

5.4. Features To Enhance The Version

There are some advanced features that may be added to the delivery personnel version of the app which can yield greater results. Though these features mentioned below may not be an absolute necessity, but contribute in a great way to set you apart from the thousands of other apps.

  • In app navigation for the delivery personnel from pickup to the delivery location
  • Booking history
  • Option to check the shortest pick up and delivery routes
  • SOS service

 

 

6. Partner Restaurant Version


6.1. Admin Panel

This is more of an inherent element than feature for the restaurant version of the app. An admin panel is a web based portal of a manner that helps the restaurants manage the whole process right from the placement of order, requests from delivery personnel or managing the restaurant information including any changes in the menu, delivery times etc.

This is where it all begins, and hence deserves all the possible attention and focus of the developer in providing the restaurant access to all the key features at the same time.

6.2. Registration

This feature is similar to that offered in the versions for the consumer and the delivery personnel. The restaurants too need to register themselves using either an email address and creating a password in order to be visible in the system. This feature would need the password recovery element to it.

6.3. Managing Content

The consumers and the delivery personnel make their choices based on convenience and preferences. However the restaurant version is different as it should focus on attracting the users and publishing and sharing relevant content. Hence, on any food delivery app, it is important to allow the restaurant app managers to be able to:

  • Update information or details about the restaurant including name of the restaurant, contact information, address, open hours etc.
  • Update and add photos
  • Update menus by adding or removing dishes, changing prices, descriptions, delivery charges etc.

6.4. Managing Orders

Once the profile is complete and the content is updated on the profile in totality, the restaurant then awaits the orders from the consumers. However, attention must be paid to what needs to be done once the orders start coming in. to handle this leg of the process, the following key features need to be incorporated:

  • Detailed view of the order
  • Update the status of the order and send out notifications to the consumer when it is accepted and to the delivery personnel when the order is ready to be picked up.
  • View the entire list of current orders

At the end of this stage, the food order is ready and is then dispatched for delivery.

6.5. Receiving Payments

This is one of the more simpler and direct features where the restaurant receives the payment. The payment is only released to the restaurant after the consumer confirms that they have received the food.

6.6. Feature To Enhance The Version

While the features mentioned above are an absolute necessity when it comes to developing the restaurant version of the app, there are certain features that can definitely enhance the user experience and make your app their favorite.

  • Provision to accept the order only after the delivery guy has approved the delivery
  • Provision extended to the restaurant to opt for a featured listing in the app.
  • The invoice be generated directly from the portal and then forwarded as a message and e-mailed to the client.

7. Challenges of developing a food delivery mobile app

On-demand food delivery business is a complicated business model to begin with and when you add a mobile app to the equation, it does come with a set of unique challenges. Of course, there Is the most obvious challenge – fierce competition in the online food delivery business niche. Let’s talk about the biggest challenges they face.

7.1. Unstable customer base

In the food ordering industry, there is little to no customer loyalty. While ordering food, the prime concern among customers is getting great food at good prices without much of a hassle.

The food industry has evolved greatly, and the service standards have gone up to a level where there is not much of a difference between businesses.

It is because of this that customers change their loyalties often and without much thought. This is one of the reasons why food delivery businesses are deploying innovative marketing strategies and tactics to grab and hold the attention of customers.

7.2. Unstable price trends

The pricing within the food industry is volatile as it depends on a number of different factors, including inflation and rising food prices and of course competitive pricing.

In the food delivery business, there is a two-way pricing attack. Both partners and customers put in an unsaid pressure on the delivery businesses in their effort to grow and boost their revenue.

7.3. Inconsistency in food quality

It becomes a bit of a challenge when you promise to deliver food at the doorsteps of waiting patrons, irrespective of the distance from the food outlet.

There is a marked difference between the quality of food served up at the table and the food that is being delivered at the doorsteps.

Technology can of course help you execute the logistics part of it, but the quality of the food being delivered is an entirely different ballgame.

7.4. Bigger players eating up the smaller ones

The food delivery business may have started with the small participants taking the lead, however, as soon as the business model gained the attention of the bigger players, they wanted in!

As the race is joined by the bigger players who have an established brand value, they end up acquiring the biggest chunk of the market without much of an effort, whereas only crumbs remain for the rest of the players.

This means the smaller players and the new entrants meet a much bigger challenge when they want to expand their customer base that can bring in any value.

7.5. Logistics and tracking

The logistics and tracking part of the food delivery business is the single most critical aspect. Not only is it a challenge to plan the delivery logistics but is equally difficult to keep a track of the multiple delivery personnel who are doing the rounds.

7.6. The UI/UX

It is imperative that the user interface on the consumer version of the app be extremely interactive. The user must be able to access the nearest restaurant with great ease, right from the navigation. Following are the features that are bound to lure some good consumers in:

  • Simple registration and account setup process, preferably equipped with the provision to login through social media.

  • Providing the users easy access to find restaurants in the vicinity using their GPS, right after the registration is complete. Offer them a lot of data including relevant information about the restaurant, cuisine list, prices, deals & combos, reviews & ratings and more while allowing the consumers to search for a restaurant by name.

  • Providing the consumers with an option to add chosen dishes to their cart or remove the ones they reconsider later or might have added by mistake.

  • Providing real time tracking makes the wait a little cooler than the annoyance that it can be! The idea is to make this waiting time seem smaller, with the tracking feature a user may be anywhere, but is aware of the status of the food by the minute!

  • The payment feature is the tricky one, as most people already have their reservations about it and the slightest hitch might have them running the other way. The payment integration needs to be quick, safe, and secured. Go for most of the popular payment integrations including Paypal, Stripe, and CCAvenue.

7.7. Developing the restaurant owner app version

The restaurant version of the app is crucial in offering the restaurants an ability to manage the handling of the order and its logistics. Following are the features that need to be included in the restaurant version of the app:

  • Convenient and quick registration of the restaurant.

  • Providing the restaurants the ability to curate the content including the contact details, open hours, photos, menus, deals & discounts etc. which may be designed to attract consumers.

  • Providing the detailed view of the order, ability to confirm or reject the order and sending a notification about the tentative time of delivery. There should be a provision to check the current order list.

  • Payment channels should be provided to help the restaurants assume control over the payment they receive. Popular payment integration services like Braintree and Stripe might be a good idea.

7.8. Finding the food delivery and restaurant service partners

This is one of the more serious concerns for you. However, as of now there are only a small number of restaurants who have a digital presence which gives a lot of scope in establishing new partnerships in the arena. It might be a slow process to begin with, but once you figure out what to offer and what to ask for, it will come a little more easily. Follow the following steps and start building your app:

  • Partner with small & large restaurants and expand your business
  • Pick the right PR channels to market your idea. Social media channels and inbound marketing options may also be considered.

7.9. Finding the right food delivery app development partners

If you are like most people you do not know how to develop a mobile app and in that case you will have to partner with experts to get your app developed. When you go looking for one online, there would be thousands of names that would come up and you would have to have some filters to weed out the bad ones while keeping the good around. We suggest considering the following points and asking the right questions:

  • Consider their portfolio and question them about their experience in handling and developing food delivery app development model.

  • Observe their approach to work and determine whether they follow the Lean development process or at least Agile Development process. The agile process aids the in keeping a tab over their project milestones and the problems they might have faced during the process. This is bound to help them understand your needs in a better way and complete the project in the best possible manner.

  • While picking the development partners ensure that they provide you the complete development service including business analysis, lean app development, testing & quality assurance, and the actual release or launch. In order to be able to do so they need to follow a standard coding and utilize the latest frameworks.

  • Be aware of the technologies that they are following. Payment integrations like Stripe, Braintree, and CCAvenue SDKs ensure that food delivery apps like UberEats remain bug free. Additionally Google Places APIs to get details about the restaurants and food joints, Firebase SDK as a database service and many such more integrations fortify the app. Make sure that the development partners are aware of this.

7.10. The Planning Aspect

The idea is to be smart and be wise while planning the food delivery app that you are going to build. There are a lot of ground realities that you need to encounter and details that need to be ironed out. There are employees to be recruited, restaurants that need to be contacted, and the most critical part is to develop a perfectly designed food delivery app. Discuss the strategies with your app development company, brainstorm, strategize your promotion plan, among other things. During the promotion make it your motto to earn the consumers’ trust, showcase the USPs you have painstakingly crafted out, and let the discounts take centre-stage. This constitutes one of the most effective strategies to hold on to the consumers for a long time.

8. Business Tips

Once the technical development side of the app is sorted and taken care of, it is time to launch it to the app store of your choice and let the consumers engage with it. However, even a technically perfect app may not promise you the success you have been aiming to achieve. It is for this reason that you have to think of a strong business strategy and as always, we are here to help!

8.1. Delve deep into the market analysis

Like any other business, your food delivery start-up needs a deep analysis of the market, so that you can define your target audience, and develop an understanding of your competitors. Simple things like focusing on the foods that are more popular to a certain region or locality, finding yourself a free niche might contribute in a big way in getting you a taste of success.

8.2. Expand your user base

It’s simple math really! The more consumers you have enrolled on your app, the more orders they are going to make on your app, which in turn will bring in a higher revenue for you. Here’s a small cheat sheet to help you along in this arena.

  • Start small. Conduct the first launch in a small area in order to test your business concept on a smaller audience and get yourself a good number of users quite quickly.

  • Promote through multiple advertising channels. Do not limit yourself here and resort to the maximum number of options you can opt for including PR, social media and inbound marketing, referral programs and more.

  • Form meaningful collaborations. The small and large retailers are sure to have a certain audience, forge meaningful relationships with them and benefit from these linkages.


8.3. Retain old consumers

The job doesn’t get over once you have garnered the attention of a good number of consumers, the real job is in retaining them. A consumer who leaves your app after just one use isn’t going to help you much. The following tips might help you retain your consumers in a big way:

  • A stellar customer support system. When you provide fast, relevant, and friendly response to the consumers, they feel connected to the app and are more likely to stay with you for long.

  • Offer lucrative deals, discounts, or other offers to the consumers and keep them coming back for more.

  • Rating and review system. When consumers have a say in the quality that your app is providing, the quality of service improves, and the consumers feel valued.


8.4. Retain your couriers

You might have the best restaurant partners, and the best app out there, but without delivery guys you can’t really have a functioning service. It is therefore important to keep them engaged, interested, and loyal to your app only. Below are three strong plans to keep them interested:

  • A good compensation for their time.
  • The freedom to choose their own working hours.
  • Performance linked rewards to acknowledge their efforts.

9. Case Study: UberEats

UberEats is unique in its structure as it facilitates ordering from local restaurants and delivers the food by freelance drivers who are associated with Uber. The kind of popularity it has gained and the innovative concept that it entails has led to many a new developers or entrepreneurs considering to interpret it in their own manner. The cost of developing an app like this varies quite a bit and is largely dependent on the variety of features and on the UI/UX impact on the product and it is a good idea to get an estimate of the budget from the company that you are going to employ to do the development work for you.

This app was developed atop the popularity wave generated by the original Uber app and employs the same shared economy model. The idea here is to deliver a wide selection of foods to the tech savvy millennial.

9.1. USPs of UberEats

  • Due to the freelance drivers working on the service the delivery times are shorter and service a lot quicker

  • The range of dishes and cuisines on offer is huge and the consumers are sure to find what they are looking for instead of settling for a compromise.

  • The process of ordering is easy as a pie, making the entire experience stressfree and quick.

  • The specialised features like brunch, lunch, dinner etc. simplify the process further by saving up on time.

  • The notifications sent out to remind those people who tend to lose track of time and get caught up in work, to eat is an added human touch. It establishes a deeper bond between the consumer and the app.

  • It is possible to see the status of order and track the delivery personnel in real time and allay the anxiety induced by uncertainty that come with long waits.

10. Case Study: Deliveroo

On Deliveroo a consumer can select a food provider or a restaurant of their choice from a list of restaurants based on their location and get their chosen food items delivered to a location of their choice. The Deliveroo model is of great benefit to everyone involved, the consumers get great quality food delivered to their doorstep, restaurants that do not have the bandwidth to offer home delivery gain from this delivery system and can increase their revenue by a margin of 30% or even more, and the delivery personnel enjoy a good compensation for work where they can choose their own working hours.

10.1. USPs of Deliveroo

  • The customer support offered by them is of the highest standards.

  • By keeping a limited delivery radius they encourage the best local restaurant partners to flourish, encouraging them to better their quality and bringing simplicity to their logistics.

  • Lucrative promocodes and deals especially for first time users making onboarding easier and allaying their reservations, mostly earning a lifetime consumer.

  • The most exciting feature or USP for Deliveroo is that their average delivery time is a mere 32 minutes.

  • They have aims to partner with premium restaurants who typically do not offer delivery services. They have even partnered with a Michelin starred Indian restaurant – Trishna in Marylebone, England.

11. Case Study: Postmates

The whole concept of the app is to create a demand. Using their smartphone or desktop app, users can request an article to their doorstep. The order is only considered complete after the payment has been made. The delivery fee is added to the bill according to the distance between the pickup and drop-off locations. Once the payment is confirmed, the delivery personnel or the postmate nearest to the store or restaurant gets a notification about the order. The postmate then picks up your order and delivers it to you within an hour. Whether the postmate is travelling by car or bike, the matching is done in a way that ensures the completion of delivery within an hour. All this while, the user can track the status of the order they made and in case the order gets delayed for some reason the users get an alert from Postmates.

The underlying idea here is to empower communities to shop local without wait or delay and empower local businesses through their API to offer delivery.

11.1. USPs of Postmates

  • The delivery app lets people order anything from anywhere within the city.

  • The app charges a fairly nominal delivery fee that depends on the distance covered from the pick-up to drop off point.

  • The app has a section of special featured stores which gives exposure to specialized stores.

  • The postmates as the delivery guys are called, ensure that all deliveries are made within an hour.

  • Postmates is available 24 hours a day and for all 365 years of the day.

  • Customers or the app users can track the location of the delivery guy or the postmate once they have placed their order.

  • With Postmates users can get food or other things delivered from the places that do not deliver.

  • Businesses that do not want to invest in their own delivery fleet can expand their audience by signing up with Postmates.

12. Case Study: Grubhub

A mobile food ordering and delivery marketplace, Grubhub is focused on connecting diners who are hungry with takeout places in their vicinity. They have designed a business model which has made it pretty easy for people to order food online from a variety of places in their city and additionally it has also helped the restaurants expand their audience. They have also acquired some well-known companies like Seamless. The company manages four different brands within their niche – Grubhub, Seamless, MenuPages and AllMenus.

Grubhub--Local-Food-Delivery-

12.1. USPs of Grubhub

  • Grubhub lists almost every restaurant in the city which automatically gives the users of the app, numerous options.

  • The app lets the restaurants list discount coupons.

  • The users can rate the restaurants which is great for fellow app users and for the community.

  • Apart from the delivery option, the app also lets you select a pickup option.

  • Grubhub has its own delivery fleet.

  • In addition to a mobile app for Android and iOS, they also have a website to cater to their audience – the hungry diners.

  • Not only do the restaurants without a delivery fleet find Grubhub useful, but even those that are looking to take advantage of Grubhub’s massive userbase.

13. Case Study: DoorDash

A tech company, DoorDash has emerged as a great solution to connect people with the best in their cities. Not only do they bring in power and capability to local businesses but also have managed to generate employment by opening up new ways for people to make a living. What started as a way to facilitate door-to-door deliveries has a promise of something a lot bigger. It gives people relaxed evenings, pleasant days, deeper savings accounts, wider nets and more robust communities.

Users on DoorDash choose the food they want to order from the list of menus and restaurants on the app. Multiple features including search, nearby restaurants, filters for sorting make it easy to look for exactly what you are looking for. The users then pay for their order, which is then received by DoorDash and forwarded to the respective restaurant which prepares the food and keeps it ready. The delivery person then picks up the order from the restaurant. The delivery guys get a notification for available delivery while being presented with details like distance and directions. They can either accept or reject the order. The dashers (delivery guys) then do everything possible to shorten the delivery time. The customers may or may not tip the dashers (if they wish) which is 100% for them to keep.

DoorDash---Food-Delivery-

13.1. USPs of DoorDash

  • DoorDash has its own fleet of drivers who are called Dashers.

  • They promise and deliver a superior experience for the customers with better pricing and higher efficiency.

  • The restaurants do not need to worry about planning the logistics of delivery while still getting access to a wider audience.

  • A flexible work schedule for the dashers so that they can work according to their downtime.

  • The customers can see what’s most popular in the restaurant you are eyeing.

  • Customers or DoorDash users can rate the dashers and the restaurants and the feedback can be used to make improvements.

  • The app users or customers can track the movement of the dasher as they make their way from the restaurant to the customer’s doorstep.

  • >DoorDash also offers free “Pickup” option to their consumers saving them money and adding another convenient option for them to choose.

14. Step by Step Tutorial

Let’s simplify the whole process of making food delivery app like UberEats and its features before you create your own app with Appy Pie!

1) Open Restaurant App Builder

2) Enter your app name or restaurant name and click on the ‘Create Now’ button to start creating your own food court app

Restaurant App Maker

3) Click on ‘Save & Continue’ to move ahead

Restaurant App Maker

4) If you have an account with Appy Pie, login, otherwise create an account by signing up with us in one simple step

Restaurant App Maker

5) Once you have logged in, you will be redirected to the ‘Design Customization’ section. In this section, you can change the app icon, app background, app splash screen and much more. Next, go to the ‘My Features’ tab

Restaurant App Maker

6) Click on the ‘Restaurant’ feature

Restaurant App Maker

7) Then, click on ‘Add Restaurant’

Restaurant App Maker

8) A popup ‘Add Restaurant’ will appear on the screen. Here, you can enter all the relevant details of your restaurant including the name, a short summary, cuisine etc. and click on ‘Save’

Restaurant App Maker

9) On the dashboard now, you will see that a new restaurant has been added. Click on ‘Manage Menu’ to add the menu for the restaurant

Restaurant App Maker

10) If you wish to add a new category, simply click on ‘Add New’ under the ‘New Category’ section

Restaurant App Maker

11) Fill in all the necessary details in the ‘Add New Category’ pop up and click on ‘Save’

Restaurant App Maker

12) Once you have saved it, you will see that a new category has been added to your restaurant. If you want to add a subcategory, click on ‘Sub Cat.’, if you don’t want to do that, you can simply click on ‘Products’ to start adding the products directly. However, for demonstration purposes, let’s add a subcategory here.

Food Court App

13) Click on ‘Add Sub Category’

Restaurant App

14) Once you have done that, you will see that a new subcategory has been added to the category you selected

Food delivery app

15) Now, click on ‘Add Product’ to start adding products to this subcategory

Restaurant App Maker

16) Fill in all the necessary details on the popup that appears and click on ‘Save’

Restaurant App

17) Once you have saved it, you will see on your dashboard that a new product has been added

Food delivery app

18) Now go to ‘Manage Orders’.Here, you can manage all of your orders

Restaurant App

19) Now switch to ‘General Settings’. In the ‘General Settings’ tab, you have the option to set the working hours of your store under the section named ‘Store Opening Time’

Restaurant App Maker

20) If you are planning to get connected with your customers through FAX and SMS, provide the necessary information here. You can also add the cloud printer and contact number in this section

Food Court App

21) Next, go to the ‘Rules’ tab. You can add discount rules by clicking on ‘Add New Discount Rule’

Restaurant App

22) To add coupons for the restaurant, go to the ‘Coupons’ tab. In the ‘Coupons’ tab, click on ‘Add New Coupon’

Food delivery app

23) A popup ‘Add Coupon’ will appear. Fill in all the necessary information and click on ‘Save’ to continue

Restaurant App Maker

24) Now, go back to the ‘Configuration Settings’ tab. Here click on the ‘Select Restaurant’ dropdown menu

Food Court App

25) From the dropdown menu, select the ‘Administrator’ option

Restaurant App

26) Once you have switched to the ‘Administrator’ option, you can manage all of the restaurant settings in one go from here such as ‘Store Opening Time’

Food delivery app

27) From here you can also set FAX, Cloud Printer, Contact and SMS of your own

Restaurant App Maker

28) There is an ‘Advanced Settings’ section when you scroll down. From here you can manage different settings like payment method and delivery/pickup information. Once you are done with it, click on the ‘Save’ button

Food Court App

Restaurant App

29) Next, go to the ‘Language Settings’ tab. Here you will see all the in-app text that appears in your app. If you wish to, you can update them from here

Food delivery app

30) Next, go to ‘Cuisines’ and you can edit or manage the cuisines and even add new ones with the ‘Add New Cuisine’ button here. Here, you can add, edit and manage all your cuisines

Food Court App

31) Go to the ‘Coupons’ tab next. From here, you can add, edit and manage all your coupons

Restaurant App Maker

32) Next, click on the ‘CMS Pages’ tab. Here you can add Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy for your food court app

Restaurant App

33) Go to the ‘App Icon Settings’ section next, of you wish to upload restaurant app icon

Food delivery app

34) Here is the ‘Manage Delivery Boy’ section. From here you can add, edit and manage all the delivery boys. Click on the ‘Add Delivery Boy’ button to add a new delivery boy

Restaurant App Maker

35) A popup ‘Add Delivery Boy’ will open. Fill in all the necessary information and click on ‘Save to Continue’

Food Court App

36) In the ‘Track Delivery Boys’ section you can track the delivery boys, whereas in the ‘Delivery Boys Report’ section you can easily get the reports of the delivery boys

Restaurant App

37) Now go to import/export(menu) section where you can upload menu in CSV file format and export menu in CSV or XLS file format

Food delivery app

38) In the ‘Sales Report’ section you can check the sales report of your app on a daily, weekly or monthly basis

Restaurant App Maker

39) To check all the user reviews your app gets, you can go to the ‘Reviews’ section

Food Court App

40) Click on Cross icon to close the window

Restaurant App

41) Now, click on the ‘Save and Continue’ button to finish building your very own Food Court app

Food delivery app

15. Concluding Note

Appy Pie foresees a strong growth curve for food ordering apps similar to UberEats and a sizable increase in their popularity in the years to come. The time is ripe to get started on your own journey to building a food delivery app like UberEats and make a mark in the app world and in the industry of food delivery.

Product Name:Appy Pie AppMaker
Features:Premium
Platforms Supported:Android & iPhone
App Distribution:Google Play & App Store
App Editing:Unlimited
Push Notifications:25000/Mo
App Downloads:10,000 Downloads
Developer Account:Yes
Ads:No
Analytics:Yes
Support:Yes
Complexity:Very easy
Free plan:Yes
Paid plan:$18/app/monthly

Abhinav Girdhar

Founder and CEO of Appy Pie

App Builder

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