Takeaway culture is ruining dining scene and family values
Sydney eateries are quitting delivery giants like Uber Eats and Deliveroo amid concerns they’re stripping away already slim profit margins, while boosting a boom of eating at home that’s killing off the city’s restaurant scene.
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SYDNEY restaurants are taking food delivery giants Uber Eats and Deliveroo off the menu as the battle for the hearts and stomachs of diners reaches new levels.
The restaurant revolt comes with eateries struggling with overheads and the delivery services charging them an additional 30 per cent to 35 per cent on meals for the privilege of being transported door to door.
And worried business owners have said they are concerned the boom of restaurant dining-at-home is slowly killing off the Sydney food scene, with the number of new places opening falling by almost 50 per cent since companies like Uber Eats hit our shores a few years ago.
Carol Salloum, who runs Almond Bar in Darlinghurst, said she knew cancelling Uber Eats and Deliveroo was risky and that she might lose some customers.
But the Syrian restaurateur, who opened her place 12 years ago with her sister Sharon, did it anyway.
The sisters are leading the charge against the delivery platforms they believe are ruining the city’s restaurant scene and encouraging a “lonely society” of solitary at-home diners.
The Salloums also cited a 33 per cent commission demanded by the platforms, which is more than their profit, a compromise in the quality of the food delivered and an inability to engage with their customers. patrons return
“We got into hospitality to share our food with people, to talk to them and welcome them into our restaurant like they’re a part of our family,” Carol Salloum said. “Not to put food in a plastic container and send it off.
“For the past year I have noticed less people coming into the restaurant and instead ordering deliveries more, even some of our regulars. That’s not what we wanted. Since announcing that UberEats and Deliveroo will no longer be available we have had an amazing response, people are coming back into the restaurant to eat.”
The Salloums are not the first to push back against the international delivery platforms, which have operated in Australia since 2015. Josh Arthurs of Burgers By Josh, whose American-style burgers, hot dogs and ribs operate out of the Annandale Hotel in Sydney’s inner west, has been an outspoken opponent of UberEats since he saw his customer rating fall due to poor delivery schedules he said compromised the quality of his food.
Last year Marrickville eatery Petty Cash Cafe also dropped UberEats due to high commissions and a policy that held them solely responsible for refunds. shutting up shop
And then there are the closures people in the industry attribute to the increase in top-quality food being delivered to all and sundry
Japanese fusion restaurant Sash, which opened in Surry Hills just four months ago to much fanfare, went into liquidation last week with the owners citing a customer base that is increasingly opting to eat at home.
“The model of restaurants, cafes and coffee shops is designed for people to dine in,” Wes Lambert, chief executive of Restaurant and Catering Australia, said. “Think about what happens if you replace half of your business with delivery — add-ons like coffee, alcohol and desserts become impossible with a delivery so the value (of an order) is less.
“And you can’t make it up in volume. Eventually it will be so profit margins get squeezed to close to zero.
“But Australians love delivery, so businesses will have to adapt to the unique challenge of deliveries and that will change the traditional restaurant model.”
The number of new openings in the accommodation and food services sector has dropped from 2850 in the 2015-16 financial year to 1486 in 2017-18, with Mr Lambert saying the sector is shrinking largely due to restaurant and cafe closures.
He said that number was expected to drop again in 2019-20, predicting there will eventually be more closures than openings.
“The industry is certainly changing and is under a lot of pressure,” Mr Lambert said.
“There are restaurant closures on every street corner and (deliveries) are another pressure that was not there a few years ago.”
While the delivery culture is changing the restaurant and dining scene, family experts also claim it could impact on traditional mealtimes.
“With both parents working … any support they can get is great, and so in that sense services like UberEats can be fantastic,” Anne Hollonds, chief executive of the Australian Institute of Family Studies, said. “But you have to be careful it doesn’t become the norm. You have to see mealtimes, not just as eating food, but sitting down together and engaging at least once a week.”
A Deliveroo spokesperson said: “We’re proud to have over 11,000 restaurants on our platform across Australia and more than 8,000 riders who have flexible, well-paid work with Deliveroo. We have doubled the number of restaurants on our platform in the past 12 months, and these numbers are expanding rapidly. Through participating in online food delivery, restaurants on Deliveroo are able to access additional revenue streams they wouldn’t otherwise have by broadening their customer base. As a result, restaurants who partner with Deliveroo see sales increase on average by 30%.
“The digital economy is spurring on new ideas and innovation across Australia’s food sector and we’re seeing this drive growth for our restaurant partners. Deliveroo is helping restaurants adapt to ever changing consumer tastes and habits, thereby helping their businesses to grow and thrive in a challenging and competitive environment. We support our restaurant partners to get the most out of being part of our food delivery platform.”
An Uber Eats spoesperson said: “Uber Eats has proved popular with more than 20,000 restaurants across Australia and New Zealand because it helps them grow their business and reach new customers with a fast, reliable and efficient delivery option.”
“We place a lot of value on establishing long-term relationships with our restaurant partners and we want their businesses to thrive.”
“The restaurant service fee helps connect restaurant partners to a large network of delivery partners and customers, gives them access to 24/7 customer and operational support, as well as app development, marketing campaigns and business insights.”
“We believe in flexibility and the power of choice. The food delivery industry has been around for a while and it’s a very competitive sector, restaurants can partner with a wide range of delivery apps. We are focused on making sure we offer the most rewarding experience so that restaurants continue choose us.”
WHAT WE ORDER
Australia’s dirty Uber Eats secrets have been revealed, with one Sydney person ordering more than $1000 worth of Italian and over eight thousand people ordering a Halal Snack Pack after midnight.
The Daily Telegraph can exclusively who has been ordering what and the enormous efforts completed by Uber riders and drivers from January to June this year.
Some of the most startling figures show that one delivery partner travelled more than 80 thousand kilometres completing almost 20 thousand trips in the first half of this year.
The most popular cuisines across the country was American, with over five million orders in 2019, followed by Italian and Thai.
The most expensive order in the country comes from Sydney with a person placing a $1005.40 order with Criniti’s in Manly for a meal which contained 34 items.
While most revel in the ability to eat whatever you like whenever you like leading demographer Mark McCrindle is concerned about the societal impact.
“People used to say ‘let’s go out’ as a term meaning, let’s be social, let’s go meet people, that is slowly going away as technology and meals are brought to us,” he said.
“The implications of this is that it makes our culinary behaviours transactional. When you go to a restaurant, we dress up, there is a social discourse — all of that is taken away to a transaction.”
The service allows meals to be delivered at any time, and the most popular dish after midnight is a Halal Snack Pack.
Across the board, pizza is the most popular dish with more than 1.5 million orders in the last month which is a drastic change of pace to 2018 where hot chips orders took the top spot.
However, an Uber Eats spokeswoman told The Daily Telegraph they are noticing a trend towards healthier options.
“We are also moving away from the stigma that food delivery is ‘unhealthy’, and with more than 16,000 restaurant partners on Uber Eats, there are more healthy food options available than ever before,” she said.
“In turn, Eaters are more health conscious than ever, with healthy being a top 10 search term in Australia, and are particularly health-conscious in the summer months.”
Typically, the busiest time for deliveries is Friday night at 6pm with an average of half a million orders placed at this time every week.
National data from January — June 2019:
Biggest order: $1005.40 — 34 items from Criniti’s (Manly)
Hungriest customer: 55 times in 1 week
Top 3 Cuisines in Australia:
American (5,316,967 orders)
Italian
Thai
Top meal: Pizza with 1,462,850 orders in the last 3 months alone
Number of sides ordered this year: 1,418,718
Hungriest time of the week: Friday 6pm with an average of 540,203 orders
Most ordered meal after midnight: Halal Snack Pack with soft drink from Southern Xross Kebabs (8,263 orders)
Most ordered Indian dish: Butter chicken (110,868 orders)
Total number of salads ordered: 279,074
Total number of coffees ordered: 89,386
Total number of shakes/smoothies ordered: 75,634
Total number of Banh Mi ordered: 12,532
Total distance travelled by top delivery partner: 19,153 trips, 80,740km travelled
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