This Week In Foodservice

The editorial team aggregates key industry information and provides brief analysis to help foodservice professionals navigate the data.

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Kitchen Rental Program Rolls Out, Robotic Meal Delivery in China and Foodservice Distributors’ Labor Woes

Kitchen United represents a fast-growing, behind-the-scenes company that may be on a fast track toward growth. Backed by a recent round of funding that generated $10 million, the virtual restaurant provider will open its first location outside of California in Chicago. The operation expects to begin in January.

Kitchen United serves two groups. Its first target is 10 to 20 local, regional and/or national chains that want to have a kitchen for takeout, delivery and/or catering services. This is based on the idea that some operators find takeout and catering business to be disruptive to their normal in-house operations.

Kitchen United also believes its concept offers startups and popups a low-risk way to enter the market. Operators can use the facilities on an hourly or monthly rental basis.

In addition to the Chicago market, Kitchen United plans on adding locations in Atlanta, Columbus, Denver, Los Angeles, New York, Phoenix and Seattle.

Economic News This Week

Foodservice News This Week

  • Food distributors’ labor problems are having a major impact on operators. A serious shortage of truck drivers is causing problems with numerous U.S. businesses, including foodservice distributors. A recent report notes warehouse workers remain in short supply as well. These supply chain-related challenges, in turn, force foodservice operators to make changes in how they do business. For instance, Texas Roadhouse is making larger but less frequent orders to avoid running out of product. The Firehouse Restaurant Group is expanding storage capacity in the company’s new restaurants by 15 percent. This would seem to make a stronger market for refrigeration, freezers and shelving.
  • Robots deliver meals to workers in Chinese office buildings. A delivery person hands the food to a 3-foot tall robot that then uses an elevator to find its way to the correct floor. The robot can communicate by voice command with the elevator. When reaching the correct floor, the robot then calls the customer’s cell phone. The customer enters the last 4 digits of the cell phone to get their delivery. The robots are also being tried in hospitals and hotels.
  • Aaron Allen Foodservice Consulting takes a look at the U.S. pizza business. The U.S. pizza market is the most competitive — read: saturated — in the world. Sixteen pizza companies make it into the top 200 U.S. chains. Slicing the revenue among those 16, Domino’s and Pizza Hut account for 50 percent of the pizza sales dollars. Add in Little Caesar’s and Papa John’s and the largest four chains are doing an amazing 79 percent of the 16 largest pizza chain’s dollar volume.
  • Three old foodservice chains hit the comeback trail. Once they were successful, but for various reasons they shrunk. Now the Wall Street Journal says that Shakey’s Pizza, The Ground Round and Frisch’s Big Boy, which all have new owners in the past few years, are planning on growing again.
  • Growth Chains: Jollibee Fried Chicken plans to grow to 150 U.S. locations from 37 in the next 5 years. Famous Toastery opened 12 restaurants this year and plans to open at least the same number in 2019.
  • Comparable Store Sales Reports: Jack in the Box (System up 0.5 percent, Company owned up 0.8 percent and Franchised up 0.4 percent) and Ruth’s Chris Steak House up 3.7 percent.

For details and same-store sales of other chains, please click here for the Green Sheet.