Food is an innate need, but cooking feels like a chore. This clash is what makes food delivery apps so indisposable, especially in urban areas. With a rampant population of singles, bachelors, nomads, nuclear families, and double-income households, food delivery is a viable option, especially when it holds at affordable rates and offers stellar service.
Now, with these apps branching into other deliveries like groceries and even odd errands courtesy of their vast and established delivery networks, these food delivery apps will only become more pervasive, permeating different age and income groups with their amenities.
As with most thriving businesses, the other aspect plays on human psychology, the chinks in the armor of human existence. In the era when our grandmothers helmed the kitchen, there was nary an alternative to home-cooked food. Even today, our nostalgia for our past is rooted irrevocably in the fragrance from the kitchen and what our mother packed in our lunch box for school.
Women’s labor was also exploited to provide sustenance to the rest of the household. Now, with more and more women entering the workforce and having thriving careers post marriage and motherhood, any release from the shackles of domestic responsibilities is a reprieve. In some ways, our shifting family structures, work demands, and our need to lead a life of purpose, pleasure, and accomplishment mean that everyday tasks take a backseat, or get outsourced, which is where food delivery apps step in.
Additionally, in a convenience-addled culture, where our entertainment is on-demand, the internet connects in less than a second, dating apps promise to find you a partner in minutes, you can buy clothes or even file paperwork online, and food delivery apps are part of how we live now, with the expectation of being serviced at our beck and call. While some of it is a necessity, the abundance of amenities has perhaps exacerbated our procrastination and increased our reliance on external services.