Local restaurants to add grocery delivery to menu
Fusian locations will offer fresh produce and other items.
Amid the forced shutdown of dining rooms statewide, one Ohio restaurant chain with deep Dayton ties and three locations in the area is temporarily becoming a grocery store of sorts.
And it delivers.
Fusian restaurants in the Dayton, Cincinnati, Cleveland and Toledo areas today will start delivering groceries along with its own menu items.
Restaurant supply warehouses in the Miami Valley and elsewhere in Ohio are filled with perishable inventory ordered in anticipation of robust bar and restaurant business tied to NCAA basketball and St. Patrick’s Day celebrations in restaurants and bars — but all were canceled due to the coronavirus outbreak, Stephan Harman, an Oakwood native and co-founder of Fusian, said Wednesday.
Because most of these restaurant-supply warehouses do not stock grocery stores, the inventory could go to waste, Harman said.
Meanwhile, grocery stores have been inundated with shoppers who are sweeping the shelves clean of some items so quickly that some grocery companies have had to shorten store hours.
Fusian’s solution: deliver groceries along with its own sushi rolls and bowls and other menu items. Vegetables such as avocados, cucumbers, red onions, bell peppers, scallions, pineapple, white rice and more will be available for same-day delivery from all three Dayton-area Fusian restaurants and the chain’s seven other locations statewide, Harman said.
Delivery will be made by Fusian’s fleet of delivery drivers and by third-party delivery drivers, he said. The delivery fee will be $1.
“We’re leveraging our own online ordering platform,” Harman said. “This is a unique opportunity to get produce and food supplies into people’s homes.
Fusian diligently follows CDC guidelines and local health department sanitation codes, Harman said.
“This produce has far fewer hands touching it than what you buy in grocery stores,” the Fusian co-founder said.
There is a possibility Fusian will add groceries such as eggs and dairy items to the delivery menu, Harman said.
For more information, go to Fusian.com.
Contact this reporter at 937-225-7355 or email Mark.Fisher@coxinc.com.