TAKEAWAY DELIVERY SERVICE Deliveroo hopes to gobble up more of the Irish grocery delivery market by allowing customers to order from up to three shops for no extra delivery fee.

The new ‘bundles’ feature will mean customers will be able to order from, say, M&S, Centra and Spar but pay only one delivery fee for the order.

The shops on the Deliveroo platform are generally smaller convenience stores. Dunnes, Tesco and SuperValu have their own express or same-day delivery options which Deliveroo will hope it can go head-to-head with.

Food delivery is big business in Ireland. When Deliveroo rival Just Eat assessed the market in 2023 it estimated its value at €2.2 billion, with people spending an average of €46 per month on takeaways – and a lot more on groceries, for those who do their shopping online. Even garage chain Maxol has recently launched a takeaway service for its deli counters. (Applegreen is on Just Eat, if you really love service station food.)

Deliveroo believes a lack of choice in any given shop on its platform is currently one of the biggest barriers to people using it for grocery and retail purchases.

At present, some customers start a grocery order on Deliveroo but then abandon it before they get to the checkout because the shop in question doesn’t have everything they need. Bundles will initially only be available for existing Deliveroo grocery customers.

What about Deliveroo workers? 

Deliveroo told The Journal its gig economy workers will receive a higher fee if they have to make multiple pick-ups, even though customers will only pay one fee.

Deliveroo’s algorithm may dispatch more than one driver or cyclist for a multi-shop order depending on the distance between the locations.

The delivery firm wants to sweeten the deal on its grocery offering by allowing customers to throw in an order from a nearby takeaway too, for no additional delivery fee. That could mean up to four different pick-ups for one order. 

Deliveroo also announced today that it will also allow people ordering takeaways to choose items from another nearby restaurant on the same order, after checking out.

Deliveroo workers will be hoping the promised extra payments are enough to compensate for the extra work. It seems likely that Deliveroo workers may end up with fewer tips if people are using one order to buy from multiple businesses.

Supermarkets go head-to-head

The shops on the Deliveroo platform are generally smaller convenience stores.

The big three in the Irish supermarket sector – Dunnes, Tesco and SuperValu – offer their own delivery services, typically charging between €4 and €8 for a delivery that usually needs to be booked at least a day in advance.

The three big supermarkets are already going head-to-head with Deliveroo’s convenience offering with their own same day or extra fast delivery services.

In some areas, groceries from Dunnes can be ordered in less than an hour from Just Eat. This afternoon, free delivery was available in Dublin city centre, along with an 11% service fee capped at €2.99.

SuperValu says it can deliver groceries in as little as 40 minutes through its partnership with Uber Eats – although this is not available in all areas. This afternoon, a basket of €48 worth of goods from a SuperValu in Dublin carried a delivery fee of €3.99 on Uber Eats along with a service fee of €2.99.

This is more expensive than Tesco’s “Whoosh” delivery service, which delivers in less than an hour in some areas including Dublin, Cork and Galway. It costs €3.99, with an additional €2 charge for baskets under €15.

Many shops on Deliveroo, including Dublin branches of Centra, Spar and M&S, have minimum basket requirements of between €9 and €15 to qualify for free or cheap delivery fees of less than €1.

Service fees are also charged on Deliveroo orders at 10% of the basket before promotions or discounts are applied, with a minimum charge of €0.99 and a maximum of €3.49. Deliveroo’s charges depend on how far customers are from the shops in question.