Do you remember that last year, around this time, Meituan set up a KeeTa to deliver food in Hong Kong, China.
At that time, we wrote an article specifically about this matter, and also analyzed how difficult it is to gnaw on the bone of the Hong Kong takeaway market.
For example, the labor cost of riders is too high, the delivery fee is more expensive than the cost of the meal, and Foodpanda and Deliveroo, the two "local snakes", have dominated the Hong Kong food delivery market for so many years...
All of this is an uphill battle for Meituan's KeeTa.
At that time, a bunch of media also looked down on Meituan's trip to Hong Kong, China, and the main focus was not optimistic, but blessings...
However, who would have thought that in just one year, Meituan would slap many people in the face, because KeeTa, which started from "zero", went straight to the first place in Hong Kong.
Not long ago, Measurable AI, a market research agency, released a set of data, saying that KeeTa's market share has reached 44%, leaving only the taillights in the second and third places.
However, I took a closer look and found that KeeTa's share is calculated based on the number of orders for food delivery, and this is only the data for a single month in March.
Strictly speaking, Foodpanda is the leader in terms of market share of all services, including food delivery, pick-up, and grocery delivery.
But one thing to say, if you look at the field of food delivery alone, KeeTa has indeed taken the top spot.
The bad reviewer also immediately checked some information and asked some people to explore what is behind KeeTa's road to success... And the result also shocked me a lot, that is, regardless of whether it is the mainland or Hong Kong, the banknote ability is really good...
Let's put it this way, as soon as KeeTa arrived in Hong Kong, there was a billion subsidy, don't look at this billion doesn't sound like much, but according to Hong Kong's 2 million takeaway users, the gold content is about equal to "in the mainland of 500 million takeaway users, dozens of tens of billions of subsidies".
The offer includes but is not limited to: new users can get a HK$300 coupon when they sign up, an exclusive HK$15 experience coupon, 3 free shipping coupons, and a full discount of HK$50 for different amounts, and another HK$50 if the new user is successful.
Therefore, on the Internet, there have been many "large-scale documentaries KeeTa takeaway legends".
For example, KeeTa's punctual guarantee, the platform will lose cash coupons when the takeaway order is overtime, and some brothers spent 29 yuan on ordering, but they were directly upside down for 100 yuan...
There is also a "one-person canteen" promoted by KeeTa, which has no threshold for delivery, and the delivery fee plus the meal cost is less than 80 Hong Kong dollars.
You know, if you use Foodpanda and Deliveroo, the free shipping starts at 100 Hong Kong dollars, and the "one-person canteen" can handle a lot of migrant workers who love to cook and want to save some money.
And KeeTa officials also revealed that in the past six months, some users have repeatedly purchased 336 times in the "one-person canteen" area, which is equivalent to holidays, an average of two orders a day...
In addition, there are also activities such as "free shipping all month in September", 29 pieces of rice noodles takeaway, etc., it can only be said that the money is almost stuffed directly into the customer's pocket...
To put it bluntly, it's actually the old way of burning money to attract users.
Looking at the data, you can also find that compared with the other two, the average unit price of KeeTa food delivery is much lower.
But we have to admit that the low-price strategy just works, and in December last year, KeeTa had already captured about 21% of the market share (in terms of GMV).
In addition to attracting users with low prices, KeeTa also has three words for riders - not bad money.
When KeeTa was first launched last year, it advertised that "riders earn up to 35,000 Hong Kong dollars per month", and since then, bad reviewers have seen many similar reports of "I deliver food in Hong Kong and earn tens of thousands of dollars a month".
On a certain book, you can also see the daily life of many people posting KeeTa food delivery on it.
Some people walked 11 hours a day to deliver food (infantry) and delivered 42 orders, earning more than 2,000, while others delivered nearly 14 hours, and 55 orders earned almost 1,500.
A KeeTa rider Xiao Li (pseudonym) told the bad reviewer that an average of 30 Hong Kong dollars for an order, if it is delivered on time, the platform will have a punctual prize of about 3 Hong Kong dollars, and the platform may have subsidies if it rains, and the official will also hold some activities from time to time, with additional bonuses.
In short, if a cavalryman (riding a bicycle to deliver food) works for 10 hours a day, he can earn 1200-1500 Hong Kong dollars. At its limit, cavalrymen could earn 40,000 Hong Kong dollars a month. There will be fewer infantry (walking and delivering food), and there will be 20,000 a month.
Another infantryman who worked part-time at KeeTa for a few days also told the bad reviewer that he compared three food delivery platforms at that time, but KeeTa's application conditions are more relaxed, and you can apply directly with a Hong Kong ID card, and you also need a legal work visa in the mainland.
No wonder some people will say, "In the past, I couldn't see half of my peers on the way to send a single order, but now I can meet more than a dozen on the way when I send an order."
In addition, according to the 21st Century Business Herald, KeeTa is also not stingy with merchants, and only charges about 20%-30% of commissions. Among the many food delivery platforms in Hong Kong, it can be regarded as on par with the average, or even lower than the average, and there are currently nearly 10,000 merchants settled in (Meituan as of 2024.1 data).
It means that users, riders, and merchants have all been properly arranged by KeeTa, and what to fight with it.
However, behind the smooth sailing, when talking to the riders, I still found a lot of problems.
One is that the platform's subsidy to riders is not as atmospheric as before.
According to Xiao Li, at the beginning, the platform would give subsidies, and the cavalry could get 2,000 without doing anything, and the infantry also had 1,000, but recently this subsidy has been gone.
Moreover, there are many riders who complain that they can take fewer orders this year.
In a group chat of KeeTa infantrymen, they often complain in the group that "there are no orders", "the unit price has dropped", and "there are fewer activities".
Several riders/infantrymen told the bad reviewer that the number of orders is indeed less than when the platform was first launched, and even the order salary is decreasing, and the average single order can earn 50 before, but now it is only about 30.
In addition, Hong Kong's food delivery guys also seem to be starting to get stuck in the algorithm.
We learned from @KeeTa observers that since the platform adjusted its algorithm some time ago, the delivery time of food delivery has been reduced by 50% compared to the beginning, and riders are often dispatched to orders far away from themselves during busy hours, etc.
These "tech buffs" have caused dissatisfaction among some full-time riders, resulting in a drop of about 30% in average rider online time.
And it's not just the riders, KeeTa is also a bit passive when it comes to merchants.
After KeeTa went live, Deliveroo and Foodpanda were not idle at all.
These two platforms said that if they want to go online on KeeTa after signing an exclusive agreement with me, they will increase their commissions to 30%-40%, and also engage in price control, so as not to allow merchants to sell low prices on other platforms.
Later, after being investigated by the Competition Commission, the two companies compromised and said that the restaurant would cooperate with a small food delivery platform with a market share of less than 10%.
But in fact, it is useless, because KeeTa's market share has exceeded 10% at the end of last year, and the novice protection period has long passed.
However, the bad reviewer thinks that for Meituan, whether KeeTa can be the first in Hong Kong is actually not so important at all.
It doesn't matter if you win or lose, it's more important to gain experience. I would think he was hypocritical when others said this, but Meituan said so in Hong Kong, and I believe it.
Meituan's CEO Wang Xing made it clear at a recent earnings conference that Hong Kong is a good testing ground for experimenting with their global-based infrastructure and practices.
Whether it is various rumors or Meituan's actions, it can also be seen that Meituan is really considering delivering food all over the world.
Last month, for example, KeeTa posted a job posting to start a business in Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia.
According to Zhiwei's report, some Meituan employees from Hong Kong, China have already been sent to Saudi Arabia, and KeeTa is likely to use the experience of Hong Kong, China, such as cooperating with local suppliers to build its own local living ecology.
Although Meituan will inevitably have to compete with several food delivery giants such as Jahez, HungerStation, and Talabat when it goes to the Middle East to play replicas, Meituan is expected to be much more relaxed with the experience of Hong Kong, China.
Let's see what kind of "x billion subsidy" will be done when KeeTa is launched in the Middle East.
You may also be able to see KeeTa riders delivering food with camels.