How Saudi Arabia Can Maximise Profits in the Booming Food Delivery Market

The Saudi Arabia food delivery market is booming; as much as 90 percent of people are actively looking for ways to simplify their lives. Undoubtedly, the country’s delivery apps have seen a jump of 460 percent in two years, from the fourth quarter of 2019 to the end of 2021. 

Online food delivery is one such service spicing up the country’s F&B space. Evolving customer demands are further fueling innovation and growth in the market. Reportlinker highlighted that Saudi Arabia’s online food ordering and delivery market was valued at US$511.21 million last year and is growing at 10.05 percent per annum until 2026.

The rising popularity of online food delivery is bound to influence order volumes and market competition. It brings attention to two pivotal factors: firstly, keeping up with the operational aspects of managing resources, scalability, and profitability, and secondly, building a loyal customer base by enhancing customer experience.

Let’s see how technology can act as a magic ingredient in cooking up a fantastic food delivery experience.

Ensuring Saudi Arabia food delivery scalability

To capitalise on growing online delivery demands, restaurants need to rapidly scale their own fleet and 3PL logistics operations.

Smart logistics management platforms enable just that.

Intelligent allocation rules consider various factors such as proximity, turnaround time, type of order, driver’s current workload, and others to assign deliveries automatically. Such platforms reduce average order allocation time by 45 percent and bring down steps in the delivery process by 77 percent. These platforms also consider cost, historical performance data, SLAs, and more while quickly onboarding 3PLs. It also allows delivery managers to raise requests for freelancers and part-time drivers.

Therefore when it comes to scaling delivery operations, a smart logistics management platform enables restaurants to scale delivery operations seamlessly and ensures cost-effectiveness by leveraging intelligent and ML-powered algorithms.

Enhancing consumer experience

Time is of the essence in the food delivery business. A survey validates that delivery speed (77 percent) is one of the top reasons consumers select a restaurant. Moreover, customers demand complete visibility into delivery. They want to see where their order is and when it will be arriving and prefer flexible delivery times and locations.

AI, ML, and automation-based logistics management solutions help businesses expedite deliveries. Route planning and optimization engine charts out the most cost-efficient route to the customer location to ensure agility. En route order clubbing enables drivers to pick up and drop off multiple orders in one trip, ensuring shorter delivery TAT and increasing on-time delivery volumes by 24 percent.

Solutions like these empower businesses to provide customers with greater control over deliveries. It ensures that customers can change their preferred delivery slots/locations according to their convenience.

Since modern customers are driven by “instant gratification,” it’s vital that restaurants provide real-time updates on delivery status. Smart logistics management platforms provide end customers with real-time tracking links and keep a customer engaged through SMSs, WhatsApp and even mail if need be.

Estimated time of arrivals or ETAs also forms a crucial part of a delightful food delivery experience. ML-powered delivery management tools help restaurants provide dynamic ETAs to their customers, further adding an essential layer of delivery transparency.

With payment options multiplying, it’s equally important that restaurants offer payment options that best suit a customer. Smart delivery management platforms ensure that restaurants have the required infrastructure in place to accept all sorts of payments, from cash and digital wallets to more advanced real-time payment options. Not just that, changing “cash on delivery” to other convenient payment options while delivering an order can be done easily using such platforms.

Boosting delivery profitability

Logistical dependencies, manual processes, and the need to stay on top of the competition can shrink a restaurant’s bottom line.

Increasing resource/fleet performance is an excellent way to counter this challenge. For instance, efficient resource management can help restaurants utilize their existing fleet better, avoiding cash burn on additional onboarding. AI-powered dynamic route planner and en route order clubbing improve delivery productivity by reducing the distance travelled, eliminating empty miles, and increasing deliveries per driver by 14 percent. Vehicle capacity optimization ensures that the vehicle is utilized up to optimum levels to reduce trip volumes. This is great, even from an environmental perspective. A five percent decrease in distance travelled can reduce trip volumes by six percent

Driver management is another critical aspect of ensuring delivery profitability. Advanced solutions empower delivery managers to effectively manage driver KPIs such as time taken to start the ride after receiving the order, reach the gate and back, and other factors. Moreover, delivery managers can confirm if the driver followed the system-generated planned route or deviated to investigate delayed deliveries.

Whether you have your own fleet or leverage services of 3PL for food deliveries, inefficient and manual processes could eat into your profitability.

As the food segment in Saudi Arabia continues to grow, choosing the right technology partner can make a winning difference. Using modern tools to brew the perfect blend of customer-centricity and operational excellence will be essential for driving growth and battling competition.

SHIPSY MEDIA CONTACT

arjun.alva@shipsy.io