Food delivery is the trend with Maple, Blue Apron, and Snap of Groupon.
Among 2015 food trend food delivery explodes.
We have often talked about the unstoppable growth of the Food Trend, especially in Italy, where Expo 2015 is supporting such trend. Every phase of the food experience is changing dramatically, from production to distibution, delivery and online shopping.
Many players on the international market, like Google, Amazon and Groupon, are incrementing and bettering their spaces dedicated to online delivery. And the time is perfect for startups as well, thanks to the interest of international investors towards experiments like Food Panda, Postmates and Blue Apron, that have already received significant fundings.
Amazon, Google, Groupon and the delivery process
Google recently expanded its delivery express service, providing same day delivery options in cities like Boston, Chicago and Washington. Amazon launched Amazon Fresh, another same day delivery service, in New York City and extended its services to San Francisco.
When it comes to food delivery, competition is sky high and players are striving to prevail thanks to product freshness and rapid delivery. Even Groupon, the deal oriented company, is shifting its attention to supermarkets. With their new app Snap, Groupon allows to return to clients the money used to buy groceries. In the US and Canada, users shop at some supermarkets and then send a picture of the receipt to Groupon, which will return to the client the sum once it has reached 20$.
Maple is investing on Fresh Food
We are linking Food to increasingly different and specific advantages: along with food delivery, we pay attention to freshness, convenience (isn’t it great to avoid lining up at a supermarket?), respect for the environment and the connections that spring from sharing.
Food connected startups understood the need to make one step further in order to stand out in the crowd of products on the market. But how are they doing it? They are offering a total food experience, completing the delivery with a selection and partial preparation of the meal.
As pointed out by its founders, Caleb Merkl and Akshay Navle and their executive chef Soa Davies, Maple is rethinking the food delivery experience in New York:
“At a high level, we’re trying to purpose-build a company that has a singular vision to make delivery exceptional at every touchpoint,” Merkl says“To do that we really had to own the entire process — everything from sourcing ingredients to last-mile delivery.”
As you open the app you are faced with three different menues, including a vegetarian one. Once you have made your choice, the meal is delivered within 30 minutes. Despite not appearing much different from other food products, Maple’s goal is to invest on warm, freshly prepared and highly selected food, for this reason they are offering a limited number of daily menues.
Many other apps like Maple are aiming at changing the food expecience, taking it outside of restaurants and making it more on-demand. Food is connection and it is lived and valued for its communicative force as a convergence of cultures and different ways of living. For this reason, we believe that, with the start of Expo 2015, more experiences of social eating like Vizeat will emerge.
As it is happening for Maple, the startups that will succeed are those who are able to match the market demand for a personal and value oriented food experience.
Michela Di Nuzzo
« Se scrivo ciò che sento è perché così facendo abbasso la febbre di sentire». - Fernando Pessoa Giornalista e co-founder, vivo il digital come imprenditrice e appassionata. Percepisco il cambiamento come un'opportunitá mai una minaccia. Occhi spalancati e orecchie aperte, sempre pronta alla condivisione, la chiave di ogni evoluzione.
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