Crave + 16 partners to bring upscale meals to 50 U.S. markets
Crave Delivery, a new delivery platform, designed to bring high-end dining from award-winning chefs, will launch this fall. Crave has brought an integrated delivery approach and 16 celebrated chefs and restaurant owners via shared kitchens to one home delivery solution. Boise, Idaho-based Crave will also use its own employee team for delivery and aims to improve upon the meal-delivered customer experience.
The technology company announced that through data analytics, it will target fast-growing regions, expanding the reach of top chefs and restaurateurs. Through a beta dinner-only program in Boise, Crave will launch its delivery service June 1 and then expand to 50 other markets over three years. In the possibly-consolidating delivery space, the company’s plans appear to be bold, but the much-maligned third-party delivery space, with its exorbitant fees charged to restaurants, is ripe for disruption and is sure to face a barrage of newcomers and challengers over the next couple of years.
Through the “lens of the restaurants,” the company also plans to elevate the guest experience, increasing appeal for high-end restaurant partners to join. Through its ghost kitchens across the country, executives say they’ll enhance fine dining in customers’ homes. At first, Crave Delivery will feature Ethan Stowell’s ESR@HOME, Scott Crawford’s Crawford Cookshop, Seattle’s Elliott’s Oyster House, and a revival of Betelnut.
Through remote kitchens, and an integrated approach, including restaurant partners, packaging, technology, marketing, and delivery drivers, Crave Delivery plans to stand out from the crowd. Recently, customers have warmed up to prepared restaurant and foodservice meals delivery to their homes as stay-at-home orders and social distancing have arisen due to COVID-19. Experts say the ghost kitchen space will only accelerate as a result of the most recent pandemic experience.
Photo credit: Jason Arquillano (featured preview image)
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