Americans have a seemingly insatiable appetite for food delivery, with nearly 70 percent of U.S. consumers now ordering in monthly and 31 percent using third-party food delivery services at least twice a week. Yet nine out of 10 have encountered problems with the delivery experience, including long delivery times and food arriving in poor condition likely caused by those delays.
Unfortunately for foodservice providers, customers typically hold the restaurant responsible when their food fails to appear on schedule. Fifty-one percent place the bulk of the blame on the restaurant rather than the delivery service or driver, and 66 percent say delivery delays would prompt them to take their business elsewhere. It’s the old story: bad customer service will come back to bite you.
While some delays are caused by uncontrollable factors such as traffic and bad weather conditions, others involve waits at restaurant counters and other snags that occur when delivery drivers arrive to pick up orders. Eliminating these bottlenecks will likely prove to be critical in continuing the decade-plus boom in food delivery, especially for quick-service operators that saw delivery revenues jump nearly 30 percent year-over-year in Delaget’s most recent QSR Operational Index.
With that in mind, some chains are expediting both consumer and delivery driver pickup by installing solutions like smart food lockers that automate the pickup process. Orders are placed through the restaurant’s website, app or a third-party delivery platform as usual and placed in a secure compartment when completed. The technology then generates a unique access code that is used to unlock the designated compartment, avoiding involvement by restaurant staff and enabling order pickup in 10 seconds or less.
Pickup Delays Are Common
Studies confirm that hiccups in order pickup are fairly regular occurrences. According to a recent survey of delivery drivers by Apex Order Pickup Solutions in partnership with driver tracking app Gridwise, 25 percent of drivers face average waits of more than 10 minutes, while 65 percent have experienced waits of 15 minutes or more. Reasons cited for the delays include:
- Orders are not ready when drivers arrive
- Restaurant staff is too busy to hand over the order quickly
- Orders are missing because of mix-ups or theft
- Orders are not always sorted alphabetically for easy identification
- Time is wasted checking to confirm that an order is complete
The root problem is that pickup procedures have changed very little since the birth of digital ordering fueled a surge in the takeout business.
Order handoffs between restaurant staff and delivery drivers are still largely manual. Long lines during peak hours keep drivers waiting. Open pickup shelves intended to provide self-serve pickup are vulnerable to theft as well as order pickup by the wrong customer because of unclear labeling and poor organization. Missing orders caused by those scenarios require food remakes that create even longer waits.
All of these challenges disrupt delivery schedules, decrease the likelihood that food will arrive at customer locations fresh and hot, and increase the risk of negative reviews and lost business. Add the fact that multiple drivers may be waiting to pick up orders, and the domino effect can wreak even more havoc with delivery timelines.
Automated Pickup Pays Off
While automated order pickup solutions like smart lockers have only been on the market for a few years, they are already proving their value in helping minimize late deliveries. Fully 87 percent of the drivers in the Apex/Gridwise survey who have used food lockers report faster pickup, sometimes saving 10 minutes or more. Respondents also cited advantages that contribute to that pickup efficiency, including order readiness (65 percent), easy identification of the correct order (43 percent), elimination of order errors (39 percent), no need to interact with employees (32 percent), and the ability to retrieve orders simply by scanning a code (31 percent).
The real power of these solutions is their seamless integration with each brand’s existing technology. They work with mobile ordering and order management systems to ensure that every order is accurate and complete before being placed in the locker. In addition, once the order is ready, push notifications alert customers or drivers so they can pick it up without waiting. And the use of unique access codes for fast contactless pickup guarantees that the right person retrieves the correct order.
The technology platforms behind these locker solutions also provide valuable metrics about issues such as order completion and pickup times, average order dwell times, peak dayparts, and individual store or chainwide performance, furnishing insights that can be used to optimize staffing and other operations.
Still, efficient food handoff remains the core mission of automated pickup locker solutions, and they are meeting that need for both takeout consumers and delivery drivers. Convenience is king in the QSR world, and ironing out the bumps in food pickup to maintain a high level of customer service is essential at a time when takeout and delivery are vital and growing sources of revenue. Helping delivery drivers stay on schedule can go a long way toward keeping those revenues flowing.
Ashley McNamara is Vice President, Global Marketing, at Apex Order Pickup Solutions, a leading provider of automated pickup solutions for the restaurant industry and other applications. Apex’s technology has received multiple industry honors, including several Kitchen Innovations Awards from the National Restaurant Association.
