Delivery services saved 100,000 restaurant jobs, study finds

A new study by Capital Economics has reported that delivery services such as Deliveroo protected around 100,000 restaurant jobs in the UK from being lost or furloughed over the period between April and June.

The survey shows that Deliveroo’s partners used the furlough scheme at a lower rate than the hospitality sector as a whole (33% versus 73% respectively), which reportedly underlined the “value of the trade generated by delivery services” to both restaurants and to the exchequer.

Delivery services were said to have supported the £1bn turnover for the restaurant partners of Deliveroo during the Covid-19 pandemic.

On average, the report showed 32% of employees in Deliveroo’s partner restaurants said they “continued to work” because of delivery services.

13,000 restaurants are said to have joined the Deliveroo platform since March with nearly 8,000 of them small independent restaurants that would have “struggled” without delivery services.

The Capital Economics report said delivery services helped keep parts of the hospitality sector operating in a “challenging environment” and that the cost to the government would have been “even higher” without them.

Will Shu, CEO and founder of Deliveroo said: “Deliveroo has been proud to help restaurants operate and support jobs during this difficult period. Delivery enables restaurants to sell their amazing meals to a wider customer base than they otherwise wouldn’t be able to reach.

“Thousands of restaurants have joined our platform and customer adoption has accelerated hugely. As Deliveroo and food delivery becomes an essential service, we will continue to improve our offer to customers, for example expanding our grocery range, as well as our service to restaurants.”