Hotel restaurants turn to takeaway to grow revenue

A growing number of hotels are turning to offering takeaway options to increase revenue, according to the global CEO of online food-ordering site Foodonclick.com.

Users can order takeaway food from dozens of restaurants in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Sharjah through the foodonclick.com platform. The site was founded in 2010 by the parent company in Turkey called Yemeksepeti.com, which has been running for 11 years.

Currently, Foodonclick.com works with 22 hotel restaurants across the three emirates, including outlets at Radisson Blu in Dubai Marina and Bur Dubai’s Arabian Courtyard hotel.

Nevzat Aydin said the firm received up to 10 phone calls a week from hotel restaurant managers enquiring how they could introduce takeaway options offered through foodonclick.com.

“Takeaway is a good revenue maker and more dine-in restaurants are looking to offer it, we have the same trend in Turkey. The hotel restaurants have huge potential with all of the different cuisines they offer,” said Aydin.

“With a dine-in crowd in the restaurant the maximum revenue is limited, so to increase that revenue you either have to open new restaurants or you have to have a delivery service so people are able to order from your restaurant when sitting at home. So you will see more and more upscale restaurants delivering food to houses.”

Aydin said many of the hotel restaurants only offer delivery through the foodonclick.com platform: “The problem upscale restaurants have is it’s difficult to provide a proper delivery service because the target is for dine-in customers. The takeaway service know-how we transmit for the restaurant, we also transmit for the customer,” he added.