Introducing Eats for Business

https://www.uber.com/newsroom/introducing-eats-business/

by kposehn • 8 years ago

77 32 8 years ago

Would be very amusing if they started cooking up this program because SF proposed their cafeteria ban.

btown• 8 years ago

This speaks to one of the most profound things about Uber: once an infrastructure of transportation workers is set up, a single software development project can instantly transform the value of that network no matter how large it is. Many metropolitan areas, I’d imagine, would love to incentivize their resident corporations to spend more money on local food services (those “late night food allowances” are greater than what the finance firm’s employees would spend themselves) but can neither justify the development costs nor provide upside as an incentive. Hardware meets wetware meets capitalism. It’s both a thing of beauty and a little saddening at the same time.

contingencies• 8 years ago

Say you want to last minute cater for a small meeting or conference. Suddenly adding a 15 meal or 30 dish demand in to an existing fulfillment network is not going to result in 15 minute service, or even under 1 hour service. It's going to train wreck.

dominotw• 8 years ago

hopefully has better selection than fooda.

jtokoph• 8 years ago

Uber still can’t get consumer Eats right. My last order roamed the city for 30 minutes before arriving cold. The order before that was stolen by the driver. They picked it up and left San Francisco.

Good luck getting an Uber driver to carry up 5 catering trays plus utensils and sides for your office. Maybe there’s a chance if Uber gives every driver a foldable cart that fits in the trunk without taking up luggage space for airport Uber rides.

benatkin2• 8 years ago

That doesn't mean they can't get business eats right. Your experience is probably a win for them, it means they're getting a lot of drivers of varying quality. Also if you complained about it, that helps them to deactivate drivers that steal food and improve their process (they can probably keep ones that make the food cold, some don't mind (like me, at least for most types of foods and if I'm eating by myself) and some will just use a microwave). If they only had high quality drivers, they wouldn't be the growth company that they are. For businesses they can change it up, maybe even hire W2 employees. And they can even have a good experience in places that get press like SF and a mediocre experience for places outside of it. Only a handful of decision makers will judge their business service based on their consumer performance or performance in other markets. They also have name recognition - nobody got fired for buying Microsoft.

cyphar2• 8 years ago

It's weird how positive you are about a business venture failing at the only thing that they are required to do -- bring you food in a timely fashion. "Your experience is probably a win for them" is a very strange way to prioritise what's important when running a business -- unhappy customers are a win somehow?

If they only had high quality drivers, they [...]

... would actually be a good service?

nobody got fired for buying Microsoft.

IBM, not Microsoft.

throwawayinside• 8 years ago

People may not like this answer, but it is a good summary of their internal thought process.

neotek• 8 years ago

I order from Ubereats constantly – at least once a day, sometimes two or even three – and this is my number one issue.

For some reason Uber thinks it's appropriate to assign multiple deliveries to a single driver even when those deliveries are in the complete opposite direction to one another. Doesn't make any sense at all.

TeMPOraL• 8 years ago

You'd think that the whole point of using computers for managing deliveries is to avoid precisely that.

I mean, either optimization classes I took at uni were a bunch of hokum, or for some reason companies in XXI century still don't use/can't write simple route/schedule optimizers.

goatsi• 8 years ago

Reading the press release this is just allowing individual employees to order a regular meal via uber eats and have the company pay for it directly rather than having to expense it. The only mention of catering was a box of donuts.

user5994461• 8 years ago

I never ever had this problem in London and I never heard of any friend having it either.

If it's like the Taxi app, there is a button in a corner of the app to report and they will refund you.

gtm1260• 8 years ago

Uber betting on the notch removal next year I see.

petra2• 8 years ago

A thought experiment: Lets say they manage to offer restaurant quality food(in-spite delivery) for business lunches, at half the price of a restaurant.

And let's say we see similar trends in price/quality/convenience in pre-made food for the home.

How does that affect consumer behavior with regards to restaurants ?

And how can a regular guy profit from such trends ?

golergka• 8 years ago

Regular guy already profits from such trends when he orders from Uber and similar services. I know that I profit every day when I use taxi at with higher quality and lower price than 10 years ago.

Or you can always set up a ghost kitchen - they're about to boom all around the world, I'd guess.

mooreds3• 8 years ago

If you do set up a ghost kitchen, would suggest you do some research first. Lots of laws and insurance and marketing and logistics.

I was co-founder of a startup for a few years heavily involved in this space ( https://www.thefoodcorridor.com ) and running a kitchen is not for the faint of heart. In fact, being anywhere in food is not (I also have a relative who runs a couple of food businesses).

Lots of cash flow, but skinny margins.

jypepin• 8 years ago

There is a lot of hate about this, but most comments actually sound like the OP didn't even read the article.

According to the article this is not going to be a catering service where 1 order brings food for the whole company, but an integration of Eats into Uber for Business.

a way for organizations to use Uber Eats to manage food delivery for employees, whether they’re ordering to the office or traveling for work.

So it just basically something allowing people to order food _for themselves_ while having a part of the order automatically paid by the company.

So, no issues here of driver having to "carry up 5 catering trays plus utensils and sides for your office." like the top comment said.

This is barely just a new payment system basically.

[full disclosure: I used to work at Uber, but not on Eats]

Introducing Eats for Business

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