Hello friends: As some of you may have noticed (perhaps happily) I haven’t been engaging much on Village 14 these days. My life has really be consumed working with businesses and nonprofits though my role in with chamber. Among the things I’m doing is a daily email update on business related matters (you don’t have to be a member to receive them, just sign up here.) Anyway, I thought I’d share today’s main item with you here.
If your family is like mine, ordering take out from a favorite local restaurant can be the highlight of any shelter-in-place day.
Allowing restaurants to offer takeout and delivery is even more important for our busy “essential” workers who may not have the time, or energy, to shop or cook for themselves or their families after, or during, a long workday.
Takeout and delivery also helps keep restaurants afloat and employees on the payroll (even though most operators say volume is way down and that the model is not sustainable).
One measure that would help would be to cap the high fees restaurants pay delivery services — such as UberEats, GrubHub and DoorDash — which significantly cut into a restaurant’s chance to turn a profit.
Even before the pandemic, third party delivery companies have been frustrating restaurant owners, notes the Massachusetts Restaurant Association. These companies charge up to 30 percent commission on orders. Additional processing fees and special promotions (where the discounts come exclusively out of the restaurant’s share) often take an additional cut, wiping out a restaurant’s entire margin, or worse.
That really stings at a time when the state’s restaurant industry has lost nearly $1 billion in sales and has laid off approximately 200,000 employees.
Still, many restaurant owners feel they have no choice but to work with these vendors.
“Many people will assume that we are closed or do not offer takeout if they don’t see us listed on these sites,” one Newton restaurateur said. “No matter how well we promote ourselves, sponsored ads will immediately pop up on Google from GrubHub, UberEats and DoorDash, so really we don’t stand a chance competing with their online marketing techniques.”
Municipalities across the county are stepping in. San Francisco recently imposed a cap of 15 percent on delivery fees. Similar ordinances have been filed across the country including in New York, Chicago and Providence. The Globe reported Friday that Boston and Cambridge are also looking at capping commissions.
But last week I asked Devra Bailin, Mayor Fuller’s director of economic development, if Newton would pursue a similar measure. She said Newton’s attorneys say such legislation is not permitted here.
I don’t understand why Boston and Cambridge might be able to do this, but Newton can’t. Neither does City Council President Susan Albright who told me over the weekend that she’s looking into this as well.
Greg has been such a tireless supporter of local restaurants throughout this crisis. The restaurant owners and workers are fortunate to have an advocate like that speaking out on their behalf. I know its a heartfelt mission for Greg, and I think it’s truly admirable. Many small businesses are unfortunately not going to survive this crisis.
In my opinion, rather than local government tinkering with the price charged by food delivery services, I’d rather see the City of Newton put it’s good name [and credit] to use, with a financial rescue package for local restaurants and other small business. The easiest and least expensive way to do that is by guaranteeing loans from local banks to local businesses. I’m not talking about large loans. Just enough to give local businesses a helping hand getting back into business when this is all over.
@Greg: Has the City reached out to the local businesses? I can’t tell from the website – there only seemed to be two letters under the “Resources for Businesses” tab.
@Mike: I like your idea but I’d prefer to have a sense of how large those loans may total. I also wouldn’t limit it to just restaurants. There are plenty of other small businesses and non-profits that are being hit hard.
I would like to see the Federal Government step in. Watched 60 minutes last night and just love World Central Kitchen’s model and their founder’s call on the US Government to create an agency to deal with food and hunger emergencies. Here’s a link to the segment: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/jose-andres-keep-america-fed-coronavirus-60-minutes-2020-04-19/.
I get very depressed seeing reports about farmers destroying hundreds of crops and discarding so much milk because they have no where to bring them. Yet so many in America are hungry and go without food. If the government were to provide money to farmers to continue to harvest their crops and the restaurants to help non-profit organizations help feed our hungry, that would be a win-win.
@Greg:
The City’s Legal Department could be fixed by a Mayor.
A method for skirting them is to more narrowly identify the problem (as opposed to the solution) to be addressed. You propose protecting necessarily local businesses and employment from economic predation by Silicon Valley funded venture capitalists who exploit weaknesses and long delays in any response in law or regulation through their start-ups located in San Francisco, New York, … “distant shores”.
One possible solution to solving that problem is, as you identified, is called “tax delivery companies”. But another can be found in a careful reading of this Massachusetts law. I write “careful reading” because you will note that language makes no distinction as to whether the vehicles for hire are carrying orders of food, people, or an evening newspaper (if such a thing still existed).
So, one workable solution for which Newton Legal should have no objection would be to require carriages to be licensed by the City of Newton if they are to be in the business of fulfilling delivery orders from DoorDash, GrubHub, etc.
You and Devra should be able to fill in the colors from there. For example, a response to some Councilors’ easily anticipated objection to the costs of labor required to bear the administrative burden of licensure would be an online fee-payment/collection system that would be run off the City website and deliver the proceeds as a credit directly onto the property tax account of the restaurant from where the pick-up was being made. Enforcement could be done by the proprietors who would see which drivers had or had not paid their fair share.
“Compete with disruptive business models by (you guessed it) disrupting them.”
GrubHub is really nasty. When Jumbo Seafood (the Chinese restaurant I trust to get my special orders due to allergies correct) stopped using them and delivered using their own staff, GrubHub started listing them as closed!
Another reason that we need to support our local restaurants is to recognize their essential function in feeding our First Line Troops. We just placed our order with Farm Grill and Rotisserie for tonight’s dinner and asked for 6:30pm delivery. We were told that they could deliver until 5pm, but, because they are preparing meals for the hospital, they couldn’t deliver our order later! So, we’ll happily eat at a different time to accommodate that commitment on their part! Viva Farm Grill!
Has anyone thought about organizing weekly or bi-weekly take-out orders for pick-up or delivery within each of Newton’s villages from different restaurants? Say, in Waban, for instance, maybe Waban residents could order from Stone L’Oven on a specific Monday night to be picked-up or delivered within Waban. Maybe neighbors, Area Councils, Ward Councilors, the City, the Chamber, could advertise that special night to bring a lift to that business. The next week it could be Sunday brunch from Barry’s. Maybe the next week prepared foods from Waban Market. The restaurants would know in advance that they were being marketed in their own community on that day or night and could prepare for extra orders, maybe they could even offer a free meal to a first responder for every ten meals sold that night. If we organized this kind of activity for restaurants in two villages of Newton every night, we’d reach the whole City and help to keep these guys in business. Also, maybe the waiters/waitresses laid off could help to make deliveries.
Could the city spend their allocated catering budget upfront and purchase giftcards now (to the restaurants most likely to be still in business)
Kinda risky but plausible
These “tech” food deliveries dont even make profit. Grubhub has a 27Million loss in dec 2029.. is it fair to ask a company which loses money to lose even more?
@Bugek: Not only is it completely “fair” to ask such companies to lose even more, it could be good public policy and rational to cause them to lose increasingly more money and to eventually declare Chapter 7 (not 11) bankruptcy.
The Silicon Valley ventures businesses is conducted as economic warfare: as a consumer, you are chum and everywhere you spend money are targets for where the venture capitalists investing are looking to as a source of wealth they can scoop into their pockets. Local restaurants … a source of wealth for VCs to hoover into their childrens’ private school and vacation savings accounts.
Case in point: newspapers. Google’s grow results from an aggressive interpretation of United States copyright law and protection legislated by the Federal Government to ensure their revenues would not be taxed by states. At least the Australians and Europeans understand that such bias cuts too deeply into the qualities of life they prefer.
So, you might think the Internet is for free, but it is coming out of the hide of people like the author of the original post above, which you’ve consumed and commented on for free. Making deliveries from local eateries and separating the profit their proprietors would have made, from exactly those people, is absolutely what GrubHub and company are aiming to do.
Just do takeout and skip the “middleman”
I hope there’s a way that the city could make this work or do something similar. I’m really concerned about the future of our local restaurants. I’ve been furloughed so we just can’t afford to do takeout right now and I’m sure many other local families are in a similar boat.
Sorry to hear you were furloughed MMQC. All the best to you and your family
We tried to order from Shogun through one of those apps. And we were informed that they couldn’t take our order because it was over $100 (before discount, delivery fee, and service fee) And then they claimed Shogun was closed.
So I called, and Ito-San answered (he was running the sushi counter and the phones), placed the same order for takeout, and had it come to $74.
I’ve also noticed that none of them have a place for you to tip the restaurant. You can tip your driver, but not the restaurant.
So yeah, not doing that again.
@Bugek: I can think of few things I’d prefer more than forcing GrubHub, DoorDash and other venture capital-backed business, that is intent on disrupting the financial well-being of local businesses (as those business self-declare they are), into Chapter 7.
I think it is very fair that investors sometimes realize the known-on-advance risk of losing all their principal in a business failure. All the more so when their being success can only be accomplished by removing wealth from this city, impoverishing drivers, cooks, wait staff so to send profits to financial managers in California.
Why can’t people just pick up their own take out? Wear a mask and gloves, get in the car ( or walk ) and go get it. That’s what I do. Leave a tip if you want to.
I’m with Rick and Claire.
I don’t understand the need to have someone deliver to your home. Most every restaurant will do curb pick up. At the worst, you pay in advance, drive five minutes, walk in, pick it up and walk out.
And leave a good tip.
No more hand wringing.
Why make room for pirates?
Skip the apps – pick up the phone and call the restaurants directly. (Yes, I hate talking on the phone too, but we all need to take one for the team right now. Or check their website – see if they have their own online ordering.) Pay with your card over the phone, and do a contact-less pickup.
I’m also with Rick, Clair and Terry. We’re ordering from Newton restaurants and I go and pick these orders up. They have all reordered their operations to account for social distancing. I also come with gloves and mask to do my part. I feel safe in doing this and it’s nice to know that the money I spend is going entirely to these loyal businesses and not split with some far flung faceless corporation. I’ve had some differences with Greg, but I appreciate his strong advocacy for small businesses in this city particularly for restaurants where the profit margin is so often tenuous.
I’ll take this opportunity to put in a shameless plug for a slightly different option. My old friend Chris Osborn and Better Life Foods are bedrocks of our community. He and his staff have run the kitchen, and cooked amazing dinners for 40o people for all five years of the Feasts of the Falls. He has donated and served delicious appetizers at every one of our theater’s 20 closing performances. He pitches in and helps out with countless other community events throughout the year.
Better Life Foods is a catering business. Like the restaurants, his business too has taken a gut punch. Also like many restaurants he quickly spun around and re-oriented what he’s doing. He’s now offering delicious heat-and-eat meals, focused on comfort food. You can order individual dinners, dinners for 2, or dinners for 6. He’s open for order-and pickup at his kitchen (Adams St in Nonantum) on Tues, Wed, Thurs afternoons. He delivers for orders over $100. Give Better Life Food a try.
https://betterlifefood.com/delivery-and-pickup
Economic parochialism and support of “our guys” at the expense of those greedy raiders from Silicon Valley is tempting at times like this.
I think a great many small hoteliers around the world would have similar feelings towards the ransom charged by TripAdvisor for its “service”. But it’s OK when we do it, right?
And let everyone eat cake too!
Yes if you can pick it up, that helps the restaurant. Let’s not forget that (a) not everyone has a car or can drive. (b) not everyone has the time: Think of all those “essential workers” who may be looking for a meal while working or for something to send home to their kids while they’re working and (c) not everyone is healthy enough to do pickup.
Also, what Jerry said about Better Life Food’s great menu of prepared meals. Blue Ribbon BBQ offers a similar thing. They also do their own delivery.
Newton Pizza House in the Highlands wasn’t answering their phone last week.
Yesterday, I called and it was disconnected.
I hope they are just hibernating.
So does this group hate ALL corporations or just ones not named Northland? 🙂
Novel idea: skip the GrubHubs and DoorDashs of the world, pick up that thing attached to your hand called a cell phone and phone the order. Pick up on your own or have the restaurants deliver (for some, it’s a way of keeping non-cooking staff employed).
And I too would be bummed if Newton House of Pizza is closed permanently. Such a fixture in the neighborhood.
The British have figured-out an environmentally aware (no cars involved) solution … Have a look at Milton Keynes.
Of course, we could just all be consumers and expect someone else to figure out how to satisfy our willingness to spend … but then, they get to keep whatever profits they can get regardless of at whose expense they come, don’t they?
Matt,
Along the same lines, large faceless corporations such as northland, avalon, korff should be forced to freeze rents and to immediately provide rent relief to any newton residents laid off..
.. since we want to force private companies to reduce profits, why not go all the way…
Would we ever see such a post on this website? Nah
Well now Budgek, no one is “raising rents” right now. As for providing relief to Newton residents, Northland and Robert Korf (who is hardly faceless) have donated many thousands to Newton’s Covid Relief fund, which does exactly that.
From the TABthe TAB…
@Matt: I’m not doing anything during this pandemic, except fighting to help save our local businesses and nonprofits and taking care of my family (that includes barely being on Village 14)
Sorry if that’s a problem for you.
Greg,
If Grubhub make the same donation as Korff, will that absolve them of the suggestion of the original post ?(reduce their rates)
If so, send an email to the ceo of Grubhub so they will no longer be singled out.
Its going to be extremely tough for businesses in Newton, wishing you all the best with lobbying efforts (not sarcastic). Its going to take things like tax holidays, restuarant weeks, support small businesses drives to get things rolling again
Actually the only way to truly “get things rolling again” will be more testing, better treatments and/or vaccines.