Restaurant Marketplace vs Direct Ordering: The Real Cost Comparison
What does selling through a food delivery marketplace actually cost?
Just Eat, Deliveroo and Uber Eats take a commission on every order. It's usually somewhere between 15% and 35% of the order value, depending on your plan and whether they do the delivery. On a £30 order that's £4.50 to £10.50 gone before you've paid for the food, the staff or the packaging.
If most of your trade is delivery, commission can end up as one of the biggest costs you have.
Marketplace commission rates (approximate)
Rates depend on what you negotiate, where you are and which plan you're on. These are the ranges UK and Irish restaurants commonly report:
| Platform | Commission range |
|---|---|
| Just Eat | 14% to 30%+ |
| Deliveroo | 25% to 35% |
| Uber Eats | 20% to 35% |
Who does the delivery matters. Use your own drivers and the commission drops. Use theirs and it goes up.
What direct ordering actually costs
With your own website or app you pay for different things:
- a monthly subscription for the ordering platform, instead of a cut of every order
- card processing, usually 1.2% to 1.8% per transaction
- delivery - either your own drivers, or a per-order fee if you plug into a delivery service
Add it up and most restaurants pay around 3% to 7% of order value on direct orders. On marketplaces it's 15% to 35%.
The real cost on a £30 order
| Channel | Fee | Net to restaurant |
|---|---|---|
| Marketplace (at 30%) | £9.00 | £21.00 |
| Marketplace (at 20%) | £6.00 | £24.00 |
| Direct ordering (at 5%) | £1.50 | £28.50 |
Say you do 200 delivery orders a week at £30 each. At 25% commission you hand £1,500 a week to the marketplace. At 5% on direct orders you pay £300. That's £1,200 a week, or roughly £5,200 a month, that stays with you.
What marketplaces give you that your own channel doesn't
You're paying for more than payment processing. The commission also buys you:
- people browsing the app who've never heard of you
- customers who'll only order through an app they already have on their phone
- in-app ads and promotions
That's worth something. But the commission is what pays for it, and if you've been open a while and most of your orders come from regulars, you're paying for discovery you don't need any more.
Keep the marketplaces, move your regulars
Restaurants that cut their marketplace dependence rarely leave the apps altogether. They use the marketplaces to find new customers, then get the ones who come back to order direct. They watch the split between channels and push it towards direct bit by bit.
The number to find out is how many of your marketplace orders come from first-time customers and how many come from people who've ordered before. If 80% of your Deliveroo orders are from regulars, you're paying 30% to keep customers who already like you.
How to move customers to direct ordering
- Put a card or flyer in every marketplace bag with a discount code for ordering direct
- Get staff to tell walk-in customers about your website or app
- Send email and SMS offers. You only get that customer data from your own channel, so this is something the marketplaces can't give you
- Keep loyalty rewards for people who order through your own site or app
How Flipdish helps restaurants build direct ordering
Flipdish provides branded websites, mobile apps and self-service kiosks so restaurants can take orders without paying marketplace commission. Direct and marketplace orders land in the same POS and kitchen system, so the kitchen handles them exactly the same way.
Flipdish also has AI marketing tools for messaging your direct customers and running loyalty, so more of your regulars order from you instead of through the apps.
Flipdish publishes its online ordering pricing on its website.