The business of online food ordering and delivery is undergoing a rapid change as new startups race to capture markets across the globe. No doubt, these startups are attracting investment. However, there is little knowledge available on market dynamics, customer behavior, and competitors.
Different types of customers expect different types of features from an online food ordering and delivery company. For example:
To enable entrepreneurs make an informed decision, FATbit Technologies conducted a research to find out some online food business ideas that have huge growth potential. Without further ado, let’s go through the following information for an overview of different ideas, key established businesses in that segment, and more.
School lunches are every parent’s daily concern as they want their kids to eat healthy food. A couple of questions that parents often think are:
An entrepreneur can create a marketplace to connect schools with restaurants or kitchens that provide these lunches. It will be a profitable venture for everyone associated; schools, restaurants/kitchens, parents, and website owner(s). Schools will have multiple restaurant options to order lunch for the students and can also order specialized food if a student is allergic to certain ingredients. Restaurants/kitchens can increase their business by collaborating with multiple schools for lunch service for students.
And, website owner earns through various sources; advertisements, registration fees from schools and restaurants, etc.
Chefables: This platform works to deliver tasty, well-prepared, healthy, and family-style affordable meals to the schools for the students. They do not use pre-packaged or processed food rather cook the food from scratch.
Wholesome Food Services: They offer a unique school lunch program providing great lunch options for students and staff as well as a comprehensive lunch program administration for schools at reasonable prices.
Choicelunch: For the parents, who are busy and not able to feed their kids with healthy food, Choicelunch offers them with healthy food options for their kids. Available for Android and iPhone, this mobile app allows parents to order lunch for their kids anytime and anywhere.
The online office food ordering and delivery business is a welcome treat for employees who don’t have time to make the food before they leave for the office. The service also appeals to employees who do not have access to local eateries during their lunchtime. By implementing this business idea and creating an online marketplace, you can connect a number of kitchens with different offices.
Foodsby: This is an online marketplace connecting employees in office with local restaurants to provide them with a variety of easy lunch options. They give hardworking professionals the freedom to eat well and remain productive in their work-life.
Platterz: An online platform that has collaborated with restaurants and caterers to provide incredible food to the offices to cultivate happy workplaces and improve office culture.
Green Attitude: An online platform that delivers a wide range of fresh and healthy lunch options in offices and companies. They cook homemade natural foods for employees, meetings, events, and receptions.
For senior citizens, there are a lot of challenges associated with meal planning and preparation. Sometimes, their family members or care-takers don’t have time and resources to organize all their meals. This problem has only one solution; online food ordering and delivery business for senior citizens or senior meal-prep and delivery service.
Silver Cuisine: They deliver home-cooked chef-prepared meals keeping seniors and their nutritional needs in mind. User simply needs to select the food he/she wants to have delivered, and they take care of the rest, giving you the peace of mind knowing that your loved one is eating healthy and doctor-designed meals.
Magic Kitchen: They provide top quality, nutritional meal options, and exceptional levels of customer service for busy families and seniors. Their focus is senior meal programs where parents can enjoy quality, healthy meals with little prep or cleanup.
During the never-ending queues for the check-in and security check at the airports, there is hardly any time left to relax and enjoy a meal before boarding a flight. Although airlines offer to have meals on board, many people do not prefer it as there are limited options available. Launching a food ordering and delivery service at the airports that enables passengers to get their favorite food delivered at their boarding gates is a great business idea.
AtYourGate: This is a mobile app for food ordering and delivery within the airport for the passengers, flight crew, and airport employees. Apart from food, AtYourGate also delivers all the travel essentials to the flyers within the airport.
Grab: This mobile app works with selected airport restaurants to allow ordering through their app. Passengers at the airport can place their order through the app and make the payment. Then they can just go straight to the pick-up counter bypassing the queue. The app is only available at selected airports, although the number is growing, both in terms of airports and number of merchants at each airport.
People these days have high demanding jobs and busy schedules, and therefore prefer online food ordering and delivery subscriptions because of its convenience. However, the demand for homemade food is skyrocketing as it provides fresh and homemade delicious food to the ones who do not have time or skills to cook food at home. Online homemade food ordering and delivery businesses provide healthier food options than what other fast food and restaurant delivery counterparts provide.
DishDivvy: This is a network that connects amazing cooks with homemade food lovers who are seeking homemade food. Eliminating the expensive meal prep kits or restaurant foods, DishDivvy serves home-cooked food for the people who don’t have time, skills, or passion to create new and exciting meals.
Mumm: This is an online platform that connects talented homebased cooks to the people who are working and do not get time to cook their meals. Mumm provides them access to wholesome fresh homemade food from Mumm’s Prime menu which includes options from Egyptian, Arab, and international cuisines. All you need to do is place your food order and one of the delivery personnel will deliver it at your place within no time.
Cloud Kitchen is the latest and immensely popular trend that has quickly established itself in the restaurant space. This format allows the restaurant owner to launch more than one brand in the same kitchen using the same resources and offering different specialties/cuisines. The orders are received through online food aggregators, food ordering websites, and telephone.
Kitchen United: Working on the mission to deliver delicious food options to food lovers who crave variety also eliminating barriers to growth for restaurants to expand, Kitchen United is growing quickly across the USA.
Virtual Kitchen: Empowering restaurants to take full advantage of technology and minimal upfront investment, and delivering delicious meals to crazy food lovers, Virtual Kitchen is operating and expanding quickly.
Some hospitals have implemented patient meal ordering software through which patients can order food while considering the medical condition. Presently, there is no such dedicated platform for hospital food ordering and delivery which gives rise to a need for an online marketplace that can provide doctor-prescribed food for patients at hospitals as well as homes.
Note: For the successful working of such a marketplace, the patient’s medical conditions are required to be shared by the hospital with the service provider, and then, the food can be delivered accordingly.
There are some online food ordering websites that have a section “Special diet” or “Doctor’s prescribed diet”, however, there is no dedicated platform that provides online food ordering and delivery service to hospitals for patients.
There is a common misconception that personal chefs are only for celebrities. Most people wish to eat healthy food prepared by professional chefs. With a marketplace for personal chefs, common people can also order food from their favorite chefs and enjoy delicious meals.
In this mobile-first era, customers are looking for an enhanced experience and convenience. In simple words, consumers want a specialized solution that can offer them many options while bringing ease. With the information provided in this blog post, entrepreneurs need to analyze the competition and get back to the white-board to refine their strategy.
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Rohan Sharma is a Marketing Analyst and a B2B Content Marketer who writes impactful marketing material for a wide range of industries, notably for Ecommerce and Online Reputation Management.
