GrabFood hungry for more customers

The lockdown boosted food delivery sales, but GrabFood is still hungry for more customers. They’ve launched a major marketing campaign called “Feed Your Hunger” with discounts and deals to get more people ordering food through the mobile application.

The campaign goes from now until October 4. They’re offering free delivery service for those in a 3 kilometre radius. Many of the discounts offer 50% off the meal. GrabFood say they hope the deals will double the amount of customers as well as sales. While the food delivery business is growing, it’s been unprofitable and more customers are needed to maintain the business, according to Grab Thailand’s marketing head Chantsuda Thananitayaudom.

“Most of the GrabFood users are 20-39, and we aim to attract office workers and university students to our platform.”

GrabFood tripled their user base during the March lockdown, but the company’s ride service didn’t do too well. Before the pandemic, both Grab’s food delivery service and ride service were about on the same level, according to Chantsuda. The ride service revenue dropped by 90% while food delivery as well as parcel delivery have increased, she says.

At the moment, GrabFood operates in 35 cities in Thailand and has 3 so-called “cloud kitchens” which specialise in preparing food for delivery. The company plans to open 2 to 3 more cloud kitchens. Around 80,000 restaurants are partnered with the delivery service and the company has around 100,000 drivers.

“Grab sees the potential of the food ordering business in Thailand, which continues to grow as the pandemic has changed people’s behaviour to use such services, while mobile internet penetration has reached 80%.”

SOURCE: Bangkok Post