Under the catalysis of the epidemic, the "group meal" model has surged. In Shanghai and other cities, many life e-commerce service platforms have successively launched services such as "community group meals" and "group groups", which have improved the overall operation efficiency through centralized ordering, centralized production and centralized distribution, and have played a huge role in helping residents in epidemic areas solve the problem of dining. In fact, this "group meal" model is not only applicable to the epidemic area, two companies in the takeaway industry are debugging the "takeaway group purchase" model at a low level.
It is understood that platforms such as Meituan and Ele.me are laying out the normalization model of "takeaway group buying". Hungry Mo launched the "Hungry Mo Group" in Wuxi, Shaoxing, Jinan and other places, while the Meituan group launched the group purchase version of the takeaway product "Meituan Fight Good Rice" in Wuhu, Xiamen and other places. After testing, it was found that the two products from the page display, order process, meal type are relatively similar, are through the "hot meal recommendation + spelling order + unified delivery" method, the user centralized order, the merchant concentrated meal, the rider centralized delivery. From the perspective of product model, it seems that it is necessary to copy the previous successful catering "group purchase" idea to the takeaway business that focuses on "point-to-point", and use the scale effect to achieve "point-to-point" services, while increasing overall sales, so that merchants, users, and riders can benefit at the same time.
The reporter learned from industry insiders that Ele.me set up a "group" team last year to be responsible for product research and development and promotion, and Meituan Takeaway has already set up an innovative business department to test "spelling out good meals" in office buildings and business circles with dense crowds in many cities. The survey shows that the competition between small and medium-sized catering business groups is fierce, and at the same time, there are common problems such as few new customers, slow order concentration, and lack of meal development capabilities. Their biggest need is to improve operational efficiency under limited conditions and get more orders. At the same time, although catering consumption is becoming more and more diversified, "affordable, healthy and convenient" is still the main demand of many users for working meals. If we can fully mobilize the adjacent geographical location, work, dining rhythm of the user to spell a single takeaway, centralized meals, centralized delivery, you can meet the price concessions at the same time, for small and medium-sized catering merchants to find a new opportunity for single volume growth.
Is the group buying model with small profits and high sales a chance to help small and medium-sized businesses?
Can the takeaway group purchase model work through? Merchant willingness is especially important. Are merchants willing to partially benefit consumers in exchange for an increase in order volume, thereby driving the growth of the store market?
For small and medium-sized businesses, the "group purchase" model can concentrate on preparing and producing meals, which can reduce operating costs. Through the creation of 1-2 kinds of event meals, the overall traffic of the store can be improved, so as to achieve small profits and high sales. According to Meituan insiders, at present, merchant access to spelling out good meals is entirely a voluntary choice of merchants, but it is not necessarily suitable for all merchants. Judging from the visit data, the data effect is not bad, and 90% of the online merchants can achieve order volume growth. For newly opened businesses, often lack of operational experience and customer accumulation, it is difficult to compete with large brands, because the spelling good meal model does not require merchants to spend energy on new product research and development, just focus on the creation of several popular meals, the spelling mode fully concentrates the needs of nearby users, so it can help them bring about exponential growth in order size per unit time.
The reporter interviewed a Wuhu merchant who is currently piloting by phone, the store is mainly engaged in sushi takeaway, the average daily order before the online spelling meal is about 100 orders, the daily orders during the peak period after the launch can reach 300 orders, the overall monthly profit has doubled, and the order volume of meals that have not been spelled out in the store has also increased significantly.
Centralized meals Users focus on urban office workers and service personnel
The reporter ordered a cup of milk tea through the way of spelling in the hungry mo "group". In the process of placing an order, you can choose two different purchase methods: "single purchase" and "group with others". If you succeed in your order, you can enjoy a better price for your meals. "Hungry Mo Group" and "Meituan Fight Good Meal" are similar to the previous "group purchase" logic, the same product in the similar area to buy more people cheaper, but the product quality will not be affected. The reporter learned from meituan insiders that in the internal demonstration stage, it has been clear that "food safety" is the red line, and it is necessary to strictly audit the qualifications of merchants in strict accordance with the standards to ensure food safety.
According to the reporter's observation, in addition to office workers, many service providers in business circles, such as store sales, real estate agents, beauty salons, are very keen on this spelling model. For this type of group, because there is no canteen restaurant, the meal time is not fixed, and it is indeed more convenient to use the price of à la carte takeaway.
Rider delivery borrows from the "express delivery model"
Takeaway wants to make a "group purchase model", in addition to the supply of merchants, distribution is also an important link. The delivery mode of grouping and pieping good rice is still different from the conventional takeaway delivery mode. Because the single user must place an order at a relatively close distance, the rider's smoothness will be higher, the delivery is relatively simple, the rider can deliver multiple meals at a time, to achieve a model similar to "express delivery", and expand the "point-to-point" mode of traditional takeaway to the "point-to-surface" mode. In this mode, a single shipment can complete 2 or more previous orders. Therefore, the measurement of rider income can not be compared according to the traditional average price per order, on the whole, due to the batch delivery, the unit time of the single increase, the rider's income will also increase.
How the future development of "takeaway group buying" still needs to be tested by the market, but the takeaway industry, which has entered a mature period, while adhering to the safety bottom line, meets the diversified needs of users and finds new growth points for small and medium-sized businesses, which is indeed a new path worth exploring.