Skipcart HQ is moving downtown.

Skipcart intends to hire about 100 as it expands clients, adds drivers

A Boerne-based delivery company is moving its headquarters to downtown San Antonio and staffing up.

Skipcart crowdsources drivers and makes deliveries for grocers, retailers and restaurants in more than 1,000 U.S. cities, primarily in the Southeast and Midwest. Clients include Whataburger, Autozone and Gamestop.

Unlike many other delivery businesses, Skipcart doesn’t have its own consumer app. Instead, it integrates with clients’ digital platforms. For example, if someone opens Whataburger’s app and orders food for delivery, the burger chain checks to see if Skipcart has drivers available.

“We strive for 30 minutes or less,” said Skipcart CEO Ben Jones.

Skipcart raised $1.5 million in January 2017 for its seed round and $21 million in November 2020, according to Crunchbase, which tracks investments in tech startups. A Luxembourg venture capital firm is Skipcart’s lead investor in the company.

The company was considering relocating to another city — such as Las Vegas, Miami or Salt Lake City — but decided to remain in the area.

“Why not be a staple company in San Antonio?” Jones said. “We can still find really good talent and we have the capability to say, ‘Look at San Antonio. Skipcart is in San Antonio.’”

The company is leasing about 5,000 square feet at the Travis Park Plaza building at 711 Navarro, which is more than double its space in Boerne. Skipcart currently has 25 employees, 50 contractors in development and call center operations and about 150,000 drivers, who are independent contractors.

The company has received negative reviews on Glassdoor, Indeed and the Apple App Store from drivers. They claim they are only allowed to accept one delivery per hour and that the tips they receive are used for their base pay.

“Skipcart owes me ALL of my electronic tips,” a driver wrote on Glassdoor in January 2020. “Tips should never be used to help pay the base pay. That is deceiving to the driver as well as the customer.”

“The most I ever made from

this company was 50 dollars in about an hour period,” another wrote in February. “They don’t pay enough for trips, and then they aren’t busy enough to keep you driving instead of sitting.”

Jones said drivers are now able to make multiple deliveries per hour — a capability the company didn’t have early on.

Skipcart guarantees drivers

earn about $2.20 per delivery before tips, and makes up the difference if customers do not tip to ensure drivers make up to about $6 per delivery on average, he said.

“Some drivers obviously don’t agree with the model because it’s based on customer tips, but it allows the unit economics for this space to kind of make sense for us,” Jones said. “We encourage customers to tip to allow that driver to make more money.”

With its latest fundraising round, Skipcart plans to add

about 100 jobs over the next three years. Those positions include software developers, engineers, project managers and data analysts as well as roles in human resources, finance, sales, marketing and operations.

“We’re trying to encourage San Antonio (applicants) first, but with the current environment we’re going to do a lot of remote jobs out of San Antonio,” Jones said.