Takeout and delivery. Seems simple enough, right? And in light of the past few months, a godsend for shuttered restaurants and their patrons alike. But even before this became the only way to eat “out”, takeout and delivery were having serious growing pains. Mobile ordering has been the buzzword, the golden egg for increasing profits in an increasingly saturated industry. But the brick and mortar locations have a hard time accommodating these sales from both a physical layout and an operations standpoint.

Chainwide same-day service includes groceries, health products but not prescriptions

Very few restaurant operators are satisfied with the third-party delivery services. Here’s how you can reclaim control of your off-premises offerings.

Ahold Delhaize has announced cold storage provider Americold as its partner to build two fully-automated frozen warehouses, which are a part of the retailer’s previously announced supply chain transformation plan.

Postmates has added a new curbside pickup feature for merchants that enables both customers and delivery drivers to pick up orders without entering restaurants or retail establishments.

Uber is willing to raise its offer, but it’s unclear if it will be enough to win over Grubhub.

While acquisitions have been speculated for 18 months, the latest rumors signal a shift in the segment — one that might lead to steeper fees and reduced visibility for restaurants.

Panera announced it aims to transform the curbside experience with the launch of Panera Curbside, a geofence-enabled service that allows guests to safely and easily get their favorite Panera meals served straight to their car.

Companies like Thrive Market and Imperfect Foods are racing to accommodate new shoppers and are focused on keeping them long term.

Whole Foods on Wednesday converted a Chicago store located near DePaul University to delivery-only service — its sixth “dark” store to open in recent weeks amid record demand for online groceries.

How operators handle these shifts and adapt today will predict how well guests receive and perceive restaurant concepts tomorrow.

A McKinsey survey of 1,500 shoppers found that 20% of them have switched to a new primary store during the COVID-19 crisis. Twenty-three percent of the men and 18% of the women who took the mid-April survey said they intend to continue shopping at their new grocery store after the pandemic is over.

The partnership expands Saladworks’ footprint into 17 REEF hubs throughout 10 cities across the U.S., including Miami, Atlanta, Houston, Austin, Dallas, Chicago, New York, Nashville, San Francisco and Los Angeles, and will primarily debut as ghost kitchens supported by third-party delivery companies nationwide.

Chick-Fil-A and Papa John's have the best-performing apps among their respective rivals, helping to improve the customer experience for their mobile users, according to a study that app performance software firm HeadSpin shared with Mobile Marketer.

Convenience store Alltown Fresh has introduced fresh food crates and meal prep kits as part of its efforts to offer contactless shopping for customers during the pandemic, according to a company press release. The retailer is also offering curbside pickup and delivery through GrubHub.

DoorDash is making the pickup process even more efficient, launching a pickup product feature to ease the takeout wait time for customers.

"CEC Entertainment launched Pasqually’s Pizza & Wings, a delivery-only brand operating on its own, leveraging the operational infrastructure of Chuck E. Cheese kitchens across the nation."

A ghost kitchen is a restaurant without a dining room, operating entirely with online orders.

Imperfect Foods has raised $72 million in Series C funding in a round led by Insight Partners.

The Happetite ‘Food for Thought’ Virtual Talks are a series of free webinars created to support the restaurant industry and to help key players to outline the future of their business in the new post-Covid-19 world.

Target has resumed rolling out a program that adds fresh and frozen groceries as well as alcohol to its Drive Up curbside pickup program.

Amazon is joining India’s online food delivery market just as top local players Swiggy and Zomato reduce their workforce to steer through the coronavirus pandemic and months after Uber Eats’ exit from the nation.

​E-commerce does not need to be convenient, fun or filled with robots, writes Chicory's Hillary Reeves. The pandemic has shown it just must be reliable as well as essential.

Lyft also has integrated the security company's service into its driver and passenger apps.

Aldi is teaming up with the takeaway courier service Deliveroo to offer grocery home deliveries as the coronavirus crisis heats up demand for online shopping.

During the pandemic a lot more of us are relying on grocery delivery services. Many of them are seeing a surge in customers, including Bay Area-based company Good Eggs.

Tencent Holdings Ltd.-backed Missfresh is on the verge of closing $500 million of new financing to quicken expansion after the Covid-19 outbreak bolstered demand for fresh groceries, people familiar with the matter said.

After initial hiccups, Zomato has started grocery delivery in over 80 Indian cities with supplying essentials and is set to launch takeaway service in Australia and Portugal to support restaurants, its CEO Deepinder Goyal said on Tuesday.

Ocado shares have surged more than 60 percent after the U.K.-based online retailer signed an exclusive deal to provide its grocery delivery service to U.S. retailer Kroger.

Buymie – the personalised online grocery delivery provider – has teamed-up with Co-op to offer same-day home grocery deliveries across Bristol.

Online food delivery service Waitr is partnering with local grocery chain NuNu’s Fresh Market, to provide same-day grocery delivery service in the Lafayette area.

Nearly a quarter (24%) of consumers have taken their grocery shopping online in the months of March and April 2020 compared to 6% in 2019 highlighting the need for retailers to provide a seamless shopper experience between in-store, pickup, and delivery options, according to human behavior and analytics firm Escalent.

DropIt Delivery is once again offering same-day grocery delivery from Lindo’s to its clients.

Oyes Labs plans to roll out Shared Basket worldwide in a phased approach. The first phase launched on May 12th, 2020, is for users in United States. Phase two, planned for the week starting June 1st, 2020, would be for users in India. Europe and the rest of the world is planned for CY2021.

The rising demand for grocery delivery during coronavirus has revived a largely forgotten occupation: the milkman.

Currently, some restaurants are being charged up to 30% or more for each order, and customers must pay their own service charges, O'Farrell said.

Restaurant delivery old-timer Just Eat has questioned the provisional approval of Amazon’s £461 million investment in restaurant delivery rival Deliveroo. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) suspended its investigation into the investment last month, after Deliveroo claimed that the coronavirus pandemic had had such an impact on its business that it would need to “exit the market” — shut down — without Jeff Bezos’ billions.

Uber lost $2.9 billion in the first quarter as its overseas investments were hammered by the coronavirus pandemic, but the company is looking to its growing food delivery business and aggressive cost-cutting to ease the pain.

Restaurant owners in Katy's Asian Town are combining resources to bring down expenses during COVID19 closures.

Takeout and delivery have helped many of the segment's big brands weather the lockdown of dining rooms. Will that momentum continue?

Stay-at-home mandates and social distancing have led to sinking dining traffic, as restaurants have been bringing in revenue only from delivery and takeout. And in recurring payments, an increasing share of consumers are looking for convenience and comfort in subscriptions as they stay at home to stem the virus’ spread.

New legislation aims to make the carryout and delivery of alcoholic beverages permanent in Ohio.

Irvine, California-based gig engagement platform provider, ShiftPixy, has launched an initiative that it said in a news release will "help restaurants reclaim their brand and customer relationships via native delivery amid COVID-19."

New businesses, services target at-home grocery market even beyond COVID-19

A group of four Democratic senators led by Sen. Amy Klobuchar sent a letter Wednesday to the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) asking them to "closely monitor" Uber's potential acquisition of food-delivery startup GrubHub. Senators Patrick Leahy, Richard Blumenthal, and Cory Booker signed the letter along with Klobuchar.

The Helping Gig Economy Workers Act establishes protections that have long been advocated for by gig companies such as Uber, Lyft and Instacart at a time when pressure for them to classify their workers as full employees has intensified.

Keeping up with the changing times this Salted has delivery-only brands. It offers up to 6 brands with a delightful variety of calorie-conscious, balanced, and savory meals. Hence, you can eat without feeling guilty about the calorie intake.

With social distancing required as restaurants reopen, chains that make ordering safe will have the strongest chance to endure the aftermath of the pandemic

For restaurants, the pandemic is the start of a new normal. Off-premises dining became the only option for restaurants to bring in sales during COVID-19. It’s wise for restaurants to be set up with off-premises dining options, including no-contact online ordering, pickup, and delivery.

As dining rooms across the country begin to reopen, restaurants should keep focused on off-premise.

Digital restaurant orders and delivery orders were up for the month of March, according to new numbers from The NPD Group. Despite — or more likely because of — state-mandated dining room closures, NPD reported digital orders for restaurant meals increased by 63 percent and delivery orders by 67 percent.

What are people doing to adjust to the new normal?