Driving better delivery
Recently rebranded company WeDispatch provides technology which digitises and improves the delivery process for restaurants and retail businesses
Food delivery is big business, yet the vast majority of those in the sector are still scraping by using clunky, paper-based methods to manage deliveries.
It’s a market WeDispatch is tapping into with its innovative software. Having started out as a crowd-sourced, e-commerce delivery company called WeBringg, it now provides delivery companies with software to help them manage their on-demand business.
At the moment, says CEO Sean Murray, of all the takeaways and similar businesses doing deliveries in Ireland, the UK, the US and Australia, only about 5% use software.
“It’s a case of a receipt being printed out and handed to a driver, and then the driver either knows the area or has to search,” he says. “It’s all a bit old school and cumbersome.”
WeDispatch digitises the process. Orders that go through the till come through to its platform from where they are sent to the closest driver’s app. It also neatly covers General Data Protection Regulation requirements, as there are no physical receipts floating around with customers’ details on them. And it keeps the end user happy – no more wondering when your pizza is going to arrive.
“Once the driver leaves, the customer gets an SMS with a link so they can see where the driver is and how long they will be,” says Murray.
This means the business doesn’t have to deal with phone calls, and the weblink is a golden opportunity for marketing to engaged customers.
Murray started the business with Alan Hickey in 2016; at that stage it was a basic system for deliveries. “Over time we added more features, and last year we acquired a company in Australia that had a far better software platform,” he explains. With 38 employees, WeDispatch has customers in Ireland, the UK, Australia, the US and elsewhere. Its bigger clients include Burger King, Just Eat (and its Australian subsidiary Menulog), and Papa John’s Pizza.
One of the biggest challenges to date has been recruiting the right staff. “This is consistently difficult as we’re up against Goliaths with endless budgets,” says Murray. “We’ve had to come up with creative ways of attracting and retaining the right talent.” So far this has taken the form of a stock option plan, flexible working hours and the subsidisation of up-skilling/college fees etc.
The company is gaining traction in the US and plans to focus heavily on this market. Another item high on the agenda is leveraging its global network of clients.
“If we have a contract with a global company we want to be able to say ‘we have delivery companies in countries x, y and z so you can use their networks to deliver your product’.”
“Once the driver leaves, the customer gets an SMS with a link so they can see where the driver is and how long they will be”