I assume that most of the restaurateurs /Food business associates have already either worked or heard about the delivery trends served from "Hidden kitchens " that is taking the markets by storm !
What are the different business modules of these kitchens ? let's check it out together .
I have first to share a previous experience where in one of the companies where i have worked before , we had to closedown one of the brands , and we had to operate and serve this brand's menu out from another brand's kitchen , so we simply had to put a banner at the entrance promoting the fact that we are serving the menu of the closed brand in this latter location ,
So our customers who were coming to visit our latter brand which is serving completely different cuisine could order from another menu of the other brand without necessarily seeing the chefs or team members with any type of branding of the brand , this is one type of "Ghost kitchens" .
Another type is a "Pop up -Ghost kitchen" where one brand collaborates with other restaurant brand and agree to use /rent part of their kitchen space in order to prepare and send out food to be delivered to customers but no customer knew that this food is coming from this particular kitchen/brand or location . This form of cooperation might be with the purpose of sharing rent & reducing expenses for both brands .
Let's have a closer look at the fully designed , planned and dedicated Business module of ghost or virtual kitchen !
Some investors have turned a huge space such as warehouse / exhibition center or similar structures into a big kitchen that can be divided into many small kitchens (2 to more than 20...) , these kitchens are fully equipped , and Kitchen team hired to operate each of the small cuisines ,
Next comes the role of the development team of getting leads from different brands of restaurants - either those who have an already operating restaurant business or someone who has a good concept on the paper and wish to consider a first location to introduce his/her brand , in this case we are only talking about delivery business , this is the purpose of ghost kitchens - food delivery where a guest see the names and menus of different brands , where a brand owner comes over with his team to train their menu to the existing kitchen staff that are hired to operate kitchens in each of the cuisines under the roof of the big kitchen , and this kitchen team will be producing and sending out dishes of this brand based on the training given by each brand .
As a business owner of the brand , he or she will be getting a fee % on sales similar to someone who has franchised out his/her brand .
In parallel , there is another business module of ghost /dark kitchen, where an investor will be turning a big structure into many kitchens , he / she might decide to treat the business from a real estate point of view only , So they create the many kitchens within this big structure and they don't hire a cooking team as in the first module , but they do offer a fully equipped kitchen facility and start renting out each kitchen space for specific brands , where each brand owner will occupy the space , cook and deliver their foods and simply pay a rent fee to the investor .
As we can see this trend can be there in many forms and different business modules and I believe that more complex business modules will be introduced into this trend all with the purpose of making food delivery more varied and more profitable for investors and will be giving a chance for brands to expand without necessarily having a physical location . let's keep observing this trend that is going to be one of the reasons for many restaurants (Brick & Mortar ) to closedown due to the high expenses and relatively low profitability of these when compared to serving food out of ghost kitchens that are much profitable for investors & brand owners...