Despite the overall weakness in the United States restaurant industry, foodservice delivery posted sizable gains in both visits and sales over the last five years, reports the NPD Group, a Port Washington, New York-headquartered global information company. The 20% increase in delivery sales and 10% gain in delivery foodservice visits were supported in large part by the growth of digital ordering, which now represents over half of all delivery visits.
“Delivery has become a need to have and no longer a nice to have in the restaurant industry,” said Warren Solochek, senior vice president, industry relations. “Restaurants need delivery in today’s environment in order to gain and maintain share. It has become a consumer expectation.”
Consumers are so accustomed to home and office delivery that they are ordering it at breakfast and lunch in addition to dinner, which historically has been the most popular daypart to order it, according to NPD’s new study, entitled Future of Foodservice Snapshot: Restaurant Delivery. Growth of delivery at dinner has remained flat over the last five years and has grown at breakfast and lunch.
Although digital ordering is a major contributor to the growth of foodservice delivery, using the phone to order still represents 49% of delivery visits. Third party delivery services, like UberEats, Grubhub and DoorDash, account for much of the digital delivery growth; however, the share of digital delivery by third party services is more than double among full service restaurants than that of quick service outlets, reports NPD.
“Convenience is among the chief reasons why consumers visit restaurants, and delivery brings a heightened level of it,” says Solochek. “We forecast that delivery will grow over the next five years and the growth will source to non-traditional delivery outlets and dayparts.”
