Issue #104 – OnTrend Concepts

August 4, 2022

Peter Cook, Editor

Certain companies in the ghost kitchen & virtual brand industries seem to have figured it out. While it remains to be seen if anyone can actually pull away from the pack, there are clearly a handful who think they will be the one. Should be fun to watch! There are some very interesting international headlines as well.

Make sure you stay up to speed on the industry through this digest, the Ghost Kitchen Group on LinkedIn and our in-person events.

OnTrend Concepts is building relationships with delivery kitchen, delivery, and foodtech leaders around the world. Right now we have trips planned for later this year to London, Amsterdam, Madrid, and Dubai. Let us know if you are in any of those locations (or have colleagues there) and would like to meet. We’d be happy to do so!

And now, the news…

Kitchen United Has Super-Sized Kroger Plans

A fresh $100 million from a group of strategic partners is expected to fuel the ghost kitchen provider's growth with the grocery retailer.

Kitchen United Charts Path to 500 Locations in the Next Five Years

A fresh $100 million from a group of strategic partners is expected to fuel what amounts to a 17-fold increase in the ghost kitchen company’s footprint.

The ONE Group Opens Virtual Locations of its Hit Dining Concepts, Kona Grill and Bao Yum, in Partnership with REEF Technology

As part of the new partnership, the leader in Vibe Dining is now offering fan-favorite menu items from each concept for delivery in Austin, Texas

Top sports podcast bringing new cheesesteak delivery/pickup restaurant to Texas, majority of US

Virtual Dining Concepts expands partnership with Barstool Sports to bring cheesesteak concept online.

TGI Fridays to Expand Use of Virtual Brands

The casual-dining chain is deepening its partnership with C3, bringing more of its concepts to more restaurants.

Capriotti's, Wing Zone Tap RaaS to Support Ghost Kitchen Growth

In a revolutionary move, two of the nation’s premiere fast-casual restaurant franchises announced a partnership today with RaaS (Restaurant as a Service), a management company designed to help restaurants grow their brands via a ghost kitchen model.

Coho Collective Announces Upcoming Opening of New Commissary Kitchen on the Sunshine Coast

The new facility will be Coho's sixth and is centrally located in Lower Gibsons, British Columbia

Catapult Concepts Building a New Model for Virtual Restaurants

By focusing on operational simplicity, Catapult Concepts offers a new method of operating sub brands that the founder says is exceptionally easy and truly incremental.

Wonder created an entirely new business model for meal delivery — but it comes at a price

Consumers order food through a mobile app. The food is par-cooked (in ghost or restaurant kitchens), but it comes to you in a van equipped with a kitchen and a chef that finishes your meal in the truck right outside your door — using equipment like sous vides and speciality ovens.

Digital Concept Moonbowls Opens Brick-and-Mortar in Chicago

Moonbowls, a digital-native restaurant brand serving Korean-inspired bowls across the country, announced its new flagship brick-and-mortar restaurant in Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood

Virtual Brand Opportunity Evaluation Playbook: 9 “Must-Ask” Questions To Get You to the Right Partner

It only makes sense as virtual brands are the fastest rising, hottest profit driver to hit the restaurant industry in decades. But, there’s a lot to know before you sign on.

Exploring Dark Kitchens; an Early-Stage Investment Class?

There are several attractive economic fundamentals associated with Dark Kitchens that have spurred the sector’s significant growth, particularly over the past few years.

Delivering the Digital Restaurant: Delivery is dead; long live delivery

As layoffs mount and financial markets shift, it’s important to remember that delivery — and the technology that has empowered it — is no passing fad.

Podcast: Scaling micro food halls with Jordan Bramble of Local Kitchens

The Feed by HNGRY interviews the Co-founder and Chief Technology Officer of Local Kitchens, a next-generation food platform that helps local restaurants scale their pickup and delivery through a network of suburban-centric micro food halls.

Podcast: Food Talkies Discusses Kitchen-As-A-Service

An exciting session of Food Talkies. Host Bansi Kotecha, Founder, Kytchens in a candid conversation with Ashu Agrawal, India Lead, Asia Tech Journal, as they discuss how Kytchens is flourishing the models of "Kitchen-as-a-service" in the trending era of Cloud Kitchens.

Delivery time measured in seconds: հow does modern technology help Glovo speed up order delivery in Armenia?

Oleg Goroshchak, the General Manager of Glovo in Armenia, explains what kind of orders, including odd and unusual ones, Glovo receives in Armenia, how special algorithms help speed up the delivery of orders, how the company plans to expand, and much more.

UK: BGN Helps Position Growth Kitchen for Expansion

Manchester-based brand-led design and digital agency, BGN, has created and launched a raft of new marketing collateral for food-tech startup, Growth Kitchen!

UK: London-based Clean Kitchen Club bags €2.3M to bring plant-based food to the mainstream

The company says it started out selling burgers from a small delivery kitchen and claims to have grown into one of London’s popular plant-based restaurant chains in less than two year

UK: Londonmetric strikes dark kitchens alliance

This REIT is building up in this growing subsector.

UK: Rapid grocer Gorillas launches coffee shop at London dark store

The coffee shop in Hampstead will also offer space for customers to click and collect orders made on the app, rather than having it couriered to them.

MENA: Grubtech Announces they are Entering the Egyptian Market is $5M Investment

Grubtech is a B2B Software as a Service (SaaS) platform that helps cloud kitchens and restaurants manage their inventories and payment systems.

MENA: Cloud kitchen platform Krush Brands among first businesses to join UAE’s NextGenFDI initiative

The venture will relocate its global headquarters to the UAE with an aim to triple its growth by creating 700 jobs within two years, besides moving its technology arm to the country from Europe.

MENA: India-based restaurant and cloud kitchen major Foodlink Global scripts aggressive GCC expansion

The Dubai-regional headquartered company, which operates brands such as China Bistro, India Bistro and Art of Dum, is also looking at acquiring ventures in the food sector in order to support its aggressive growth plans.

India: Uber Sells Stake in Indian Food-Delivery Company Zomato for $390 Million

The sale represents an exit from the Indian food-delivery market for Uber, which sold its Uber Eats unit in the region to Zomato in 2020 in return for a stake in the startup

India: Zomato says food delivery segment has broken even in Q1

"On the profitability front, the food delivery business hit an important milestone last quarter by getting to Adjusted EBITDA break-even. Contribution as a % of GOV increased to 2.8% in Q1FY23 as compared to 1.7% in Q4FY22 driven by improvements on both cost and revenue side, as we had indicated in the past," said CFO Akshant Goyal.

India: Chef Vicky Ratnani wants to disrupt burger segment with his gourmet cloud-kitchen brand

In an exclusive interview to Restaurant India, Celebrity chef Vicky Ratnani talks about his love for burgers and why he started a gourmet range of burger line.

Philippines: PH Startup CloudEats Bags $5M from Vulpes, Gobi Partners and BAce Capital

The cloud kitchen startup’s Series A round was significantly oversubscribed.

Brazil: Hellmann’s Launches a Dark Kitchen and New Burger Brand in Brazil

The establishment will function as a dark kitchen, fulfilling requests made in a radius of up to seven kilometers in the region of Itaim Bibi, in the south of São Paulo (SP), through the rappi delivery applications and iFood.

Our newsletters are a collection of all the news from the previous week related to each digest topic. The focus is on trends, deal announcements, technology, and other industry disruptors and innovations.

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