Nextbite Co-President Denny Post recently took part in an unusual exercise in market research.
She and some of her colleagues at the virtual brand company visited households in Denver and spent days observing residents’ food delivery habits.
Known as an ethnography, the practice has its roots in anthropology—“Margaret Mead living with the tribes,” Post said. The idea was to get a look at restaurant delivery from the customer’s perspective.
The research comes at a pivotal moment for virtual brands. As customers return to more normal dining behaviors, there are questions about whether they’ll continue to order as much delivery. At the same time, some wonder whether restaurants still have the capacity to manage multiple menus out of a single kitchen.
Nextbite, for instance, has pared down its library of brands to about nine from 17, Post said, dropping some concepts that proved too complex.
Denny Post joined Nextbite as co-president in June. / Photo courtesy of Nextbite
But none of that has dampened the former Red Robin CEO’s enthusiasm for virtual brands. In fact, she said, she came away from the ethnography more excited about them than ever.
“They’re certainly still necessary,” she said. “A creative and profitable revenue stream for brick-and-mortar restaurants is an eternal need.”
Here are three of Post’s observations about what’s next for delivery and virtual brands.
Gather ’round the coffee table
Post’s in-home visits revealed a change in consumers’ mealtime habits.
“One of the biggest aha’s for us is just how much the coffee table has become the new dining table,” she said.
When people order delivery, it’s a different occasion than the traditional family meal, she said. “It becomes part of what they’re doing as they’re taking in particularly television and of course now on-demand TV.”
And she noted that these customers are not just “a young single guy on the couch.”
“It is very much an adopted lifestyle” for families, people who work from home and even offices, she said.
“This demand for in-home is not going to go away, it’s not going to moderate,” she said. “It has become a new way of being for many, many consumers.”
Deconstructed meals
That last conclusion has Post primed to innovate further within delivery. One of her ideas: “Deconstructed meals” that would require some prep on the part of the customer.
The food would arrive fully prepared, but the final step of heating or assembly would be in the customers’ hands. That could help preserve quality in transit while also giving guests the ability to customize at home.
“I think virtual brands are here to stay, but they are going to occupy a really smart place on behalf of the consumer which is more about replacing what they do at home but sourcing it from a restaurant,” she said.
Packaging is a pain point
Post spent one Friday night with a group of roommates who ordered sushi from a place they visited often.
The four sushi rolls arrived “crammed into a little package” without any indication of whose was whose. There were no chopsticks or napkins. The roommates commented on how beautifully the sushi would have been presented in the restaurant—then proceeded to eat it out of the lids of the packaging.
“It’s an admittedly sub-optimal experience,” Post said. “So from a presentation standpoint, there’s definitely an opportunity.”
And packaging could also be a solution to other issues with food delivery, such as reheatability, spills and order accuracy, she said.
“There’s a lot of room to crawl over what is a pretty low bar of expectation.”