New food delivery service fails to meet expectations

New food delivery service fails to meet expectations

Cameron Bates, Contributor, Jakarta

It just goes to show that a well-orchestrated media launch can
have an immediate impact on a business.

Less than a week after PesanDelivery officially launched
itself at Kinara restaurant, Kemang, on July 3, the number of
motorcycles delivering a range of food and drinks from some of
the capital's top restaurants to hungry Jakartans has doubled.

PesanDelivery president director Beno Pranata told The Jakarta
Post that the company, which first opened on Feb. 19, now had
more than 2,000 registered clients, sales had doubled since July
3 to more than 80 deliveries a day and he was looking to increase
his staff from 22 to a minimum of 38 people.

The delivery service idea, covering Central Jakarta and parts
of West Jakarta and East Jakarta at present, is a great one.

A 60-page, illustrated guide detailing the extensive menus of
the participating 51 restaurants is available at each of the
outlets, or on its website www.PesanDelivery.com. They also
deliver flowers, documents, cigarettes, soft drinks and airline
tickets, among other things.

But are the service and food any good?

Three Post employees sampled the service and the answer was a
resounding no. The food was late (by up to 90 minutes) and
lukewarm.

I, for example, ordered Nachos Grande and Chili Con Carne from
Chi-chi's in Kemang on a Sunday evening. Though the motorcycle
trip from Kemang to our office in Palmerah, Central Jakarta, is
no more than 25 minutes, the food took 75 minutes to arrive and
was cold. And I was still hungry after completing my Rp 60,000
meal.

My colleague, who lives in Kemang, waited 90 minutes for a
delivery from Popeye's, also in Kemang. "We won't be ordering
again," he said.

PesanDelivery IT director Pidego "Dede" G. Arifandi said it
was continuing to strive to improve the speed of delivery, with
each order tracked and performance regularly reviewed.

He said the majority of customers were happy with the service.

Other complaints included the operating hours -- 9 a.m. to 9
p.m. weekdays and 10 a.m. to 9.30 p.m. on weekends -- and the
almost obscene amount of packaging used in even the most simple
of delivery orders.

Dede, who once worked for the regional environmental impact
agency, said each restaurant used different packaging and it was
obvious that such environmental concerns were not a big issue in
Indonesia yet.

However, Beno, in a later interview, said they were looking to
standardize packaging, to cut down on wastage and improve heat
retention.

Vivek Singh Deora, the general manager of Kinara, Fez Lounge
and Chand Garden, Jl Kemang Raya, said he was happy with the
delivery and that the market had expanded considerably.

"It has worked really well, plus the market has reached all
the way to Kuningan, to the apartments over there ... A lot of
people have got to know more about us and have tasted the food."

They had had no complaints about cold food.

Aphrodite chef Daniel Gendre said the closer a delivery
address was to a particular restaurant, the warmer the food would
be when it was delivered.

"There is a specified area but if you want delivery out of
this area it is no problem, but of course the food will be
colder."

Daniel said people did not appear to be bothered about whether
the food was hot or warm, and they could always heat if up in a
microwave or oven.

He said some food items did not travel well and, accordingly,
Aphrodite had tailored its menu.

PesanDelivery (021) 7278-7070. Delivery charges start from Rp
1,000 within the primary (radius of a few kilometers) area of
each restaurant. A minimum order of Rp 15,000 per restaurant
applies