Offering delivery is one of the best ways to better reach diners and bring in more revenues. But attempting to implement delivery on your own requires a fair amount of time, resources and even risk to get the greatest ROI.

As a result, more restaurants are turning to third-party restaurant delivery services to make delivery easier and more efficient. Here are several of the most common challenges faced with DIY delivery – and how to overcome them by tapping into a restaurant delivery service.

Delivery has its expenses

As the saying goes, you have to spend money to make money and delivery is no exception. Rather than thinking of delivery as an added expense, consider it as an investment and new source of revenue. If you’re adding a delivery option on your own, you’ll incur significant costs upfront as you get started, such as hiring and training drivers, paying for insurance and managing tip outs. By working with a restaurant delivery service, you’re still making a significant investment but aren’t responsible for the administrative burden – and only have to pay for orders that are delivered.

Restaurants face a delivery learning curve

As is the case with any significant change in restaurant operations, adding delivery involves a learning curve. It takes time to work out the kinks of setting the right delivery boundaries and managing the influx of orders. The good news is, if you work with a restaurant delivery service, you get the knowledge and delivery expertise that you might not have on your own. While delivery is merely a piece of a restaurant owner’s job, restaurant delivery services have proven formulas that have worked with countless other restaurants to ensure orders are delivered quickly and efficiently, such as understanding traffic patterns and tracking drivers via GPS to determine when they’ll be ready to pick up additional orders.

Driver scheduling and management takes time

Managing delivery drivers is easier said than done. It takes time to determine the right number of drivers your restaurant needs at any given time and it’s important to strike the right balance. You need enough drivers to quickly and efficiently deliver orders, but scheduling too many drivers can leave you with a fleet of drivers sitting around idly during slow periods. Working with a restaurant delivery service takes all the responsibility of scheduling and managing drivers off your plate so you can spend more time making great food. Drivers are recruited and hired based on extensive background checks and delivery is assigned to the most appropriate driver based on location and traffic.

Is your restaurant looking to make the most of delivery? If so, download our new white paper, “The Restaurateur’s Guide to Delivery.”

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