Welcoming thoughts on my idea, any comments?
I'm going to be pretty honest with you, something hard to say in a community of go-getters and big thinkers.
Generally, I'm lazy as hell.
But when it comes to food, particularly lazy.
Like many people i like convenience, I like food shopping at major supermarkets as they have everything i need in one place. However, I also understand supporting that local businesses is an important part of my offline community.
This got me thinking of a business idea (not 100% refined but the concept is there) and I'd appreciate any thoughts on it IE - is this something you'd consider using as a service ETC.
Would people use a click and collect service which collects all your groceries from local businesses within your area?
step 1. Type in what you require.
Step 2. the courier/collector picks up your order from various places such as the local butcher.
step 3. delivers the goods to your door OR a close point of contact (IE - local convenience store).
Would be interested to hear your thoughts!
Depends on where you live. There are several apps available for this. I think the one to beat (also built by another IH), is Mealime. I think overall it has the features we want. The issue would be cuisines seems quite limited.
I've been working on similar product but target for Asian cuisines. Then as I do market research on this, seems the business is great when it's at small scale but as it grow, it seems always fail: check HelloFresh, Blue Apron, HomeChef, Factor 75....
So the question for me to continue is to find out what's the issue from a 20-40% margin business to money losing business as it grow....
Thanks for the feedback, I agree. That's something I've had in the back of my head. It's manageable in my area (south west london) when considering validating the idea but as it scales up and the consideration of trusting tons of store owners that's when i start finding holes.
I'll keep looking into it. Thanks!
I'm not sure where you're located, but in the Netherlands, there are a bunch of companies doing something similar (Gorillas, Getir, Flink, etc.).
My understanding is that they cause a bunch of issues and like most companies relying on gig workers, they don't have sustainable business models. For more info, I recommend this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpavEMVQpW8
What you're proposing sounds technically different, but in practice, I think the differences are too small to avoid the same pitfalls or to compete with these companies in areas where they exist.
Here in the UK we also have Getir, Jiffy and Gorillas. Their model works as they're in 100% control of their stock etc. However, like you highlighted, they're not 100% sustainable (great video, well worth a watch whoever sees this!).
I was hoping the difference with this is essentially providing a platform to equip small shop owners with a subscription service within their local area.
My problem with it is trusting those stores to fulfil orders and the repercussion comes back to my platform ETC. Unlike Gorillas who are in control!
A lot to think about and really appreciate your input. :)
Keep in touch. I am interested in all the data here as well. I am interested in this business but I am not sure how well it will perform consider the big guys lost like 90% of their market value (stocks) in 1 year.
If you are just providing the ingredients, then maybe it's easier to have some guidelines for the 3rd party shopper. If you need shops to cook for you, then quality control would be challenging. I'd think central kitchen is the only way.
A lot of supermarket already do it in France, I use this service. Might be a way of innovating by doing this for multiple stores.
Good luck!
Thanks!