3 ways to maximize your third-party delivery profitability

Delivery: It’s one of the restaurant industry’s hottest topics today, and the heat around the impact on your business is only turning up. With delivery channel growth rising 7,500% from 2018 to 2022, franchisors like Taco Bell predict 50% of sales to come from their digital channels in the near future.  

So, what does this mean for you? Likely new challenges, new processes to create and hefty fees if you’re not carefully managing this channel. To help mitigate the impact, here are three straightforward ways to increase the profitability of your third-party delivery channel that you can explore today.  

1. Up-sell soft drinks and offer bottled drinks on delivery apps like GrubHub, UberEATS, and DoorDash 

The Coca-Cola Company recently found that while 70% to 80% of on-premises restaurant transactions include a beverage in the order, only a fraction of third-party delivery orders include a beverage.  

Competing with a home’s refrigerator is no easy feat—Why purchase drinks when consumers have them at home? Level up your beverage strategy by doing the following: 

• When adding your menu to a delivery app, ensure that drinks are front-and-center with vivid imagery and thorough descriptions. Highlight drinks that are unique and can’t be found in the user’s fridge, like brand specialties. 
• Up-selling is key: activate suggestive selling within delivery platforms when it’s available. Work with the app to add beverage recommendations into the flow or to show beverage reminders in the checkout phase. 
• If you control your product mix, consider offering bottled beverages on the delivery apps.  

2. Automate your DSP reconciliation and recovery 

Automation is a hot topic in the restaurant space right now and for good reason—Operators know that the current labor market is limited, and their margins are dwindling as inflation rises.  

If you, like many modern operators, are struggling to keep up with DSPs (Delivery Service Providers) unpaid cancels, adjustments, and refunds pour in, consider automating the reconciliation and recovery of third-party delivery losses.  

This will allow you to save labor hours typically spent reconciling and recovering manually and help you maximize those DSP (Delivery Service Provider) payouts.  

The key to a profitable delivery operation? Set it and forget it – and watch the recovered revenue roll in!  

3. Set up a “Delivery Station” 

Many factors contribute to happy delivery customers—two of the biggest being 1.) speed and 2.) accuracy.  

If your kitchen or prep area allows, set up a station for the quick and efficient packaging of delivery orders. Include takeout containers, bags, cups, lids, and any bag additions that are needed like straws and sauces. Print out a checklist of things that each to-go bag needs, like cutlery, sauces, napkins, straws, etc.  

This way, employees can go down the list and ensure each order has all the key components and nothing is missed.  

That’s a wrap! Add on those high-margin sodas (or as we call them in Minnesota, pops), automate reconciliation and delivery to save time and get recovered revenue monthly and set up a delivery station to increase delivery efficiency and reduce errors like forgetting the sauces—because there’s no bigger bummer to a customer than missing their favorite sauces!