Operators crave more third-party delivery choices from vendors

Sponsored by DoorDash

Restaurant operators and their customers are a lot alike: they prefer options. As customers increasingly seek to customize their meals, operators similarly want more choices from vendors—specific goods and services that help their businesses run better and more profitably. In that light, one-size-fits-all options become cumbersome in an age that demands restaurants adjust on the fly.

In recent months, third-party partner DoorDash has heard requests for options better tailored to the needs of smaller restaurant operations. Some said DoorDash’s 30-percent commission plan provided more benefits than they required, and that the cost of such a robust option reduced profits too significantly. While appreciating the DoorDash service overall, some just needed fewer orders. Others liked giving their business more visibility by joining DashPass, while still others wanted only the top-shelf option that guarantees the most orders.

“Our restaurant partners told us they needed a change,” says Katie Egan, head of B2B product marketing at DoorDash. “We learned that operators need more flexibility and choice.”

The result is a new lineup of customizable options for joining the DoorDash app—DoorDash Basic, DoorDash Plus and DoorDash Premier.

All options include a 6-percent commission for pickup orders received through DoorDash.

DoorDash also unveiled a new offering: DoorDash Storefront. Storefront allows operators to custom-brand an online ordering webpage (using their logo and color scheme) for their own website, and offer pickup or delivery with Dashers. With Storefront, delivery fees are paid by the customer, while operators pay a standard 2.9-percent credit-card rate plus 30 cents per order, with no commission fees or monthly fees.

Tyler Kaune, director of strategic technologies at LM Restaurants in Raleigh, North Carolina, chose Storefront to convert his website traffic to sales across the chain’s eight locations. Accomplishing that goal without commission fees kept more money in Kaune’s overall marketing budget.

“With Storefront, DoorDash is taking what it has built over eight years and making it available for its small business partners, and now, with reduced fees,” Kaune says. “This is a game changer for us and so many other independent restaurants that are looking to build their own online ordering platform.”

According to Jai Meals owner Sherry Copeland, operating inside a Plano, Texas, mall made delivery essential to keeping the lights on during recent pandemic lockdowns.

“Delivery is an important part of how I have made up for lost income over the past year of dine-in closures,” Copeland says. “Despite this, my previous commission didn't work for my business. It was hard to absorb that high of a cost, especially when delivery became a large percentage of my orders.”

Switching to DoorDash Basic now allows her to offer delivery to customers “at a cost that is more aligned with my products, my goals and my customers’ needs,” she says.

While Bethan Johnson’s PizzaCo in Kokomo, Indiana, is only a single-unit operation, she views DoorDash Premium as the quickest way to gain customer recognition and sales. Following a December 2020 opening, the company partnered with DoorDash in March, and has enjoyed strong sales growth since.

“As a new business, we can’t predict what six months or a year will look like or what our needs will be,” Johnson says. “Right now, the Premier plan makes sense for us to continue growing, but it's great to have the option to move to a plan that might be better aligned with our future goals. That flexibility is key as we are just starting out.”

Christopher Payne, DoorDash's chief operating officer, says providing smaller restaurant companies with multiple options helps them capture more customers via digital channels. In a post-pandemic world, he says, keeping the greatest number of customers happy using delivery and pickup has become nearly indispensable for all restaurants.

“Over the past year, we've introduced offerings to help restaurants define their own futures,” Payne says. “We are hopeful that as restaurants reopen for indoor dining, we can be a partner that helps them accelerate into the future and continue growing. That's the most important service DoorDash can offer."

To learn more about how new DoorDash plans could improve your digital ordering, pickup, and delivery programs, visit the Products page by clicking here.