Time to Just Eat?

Malone2020

Been keeping an eye on this. The sales/growth figures for Just Eat look promising, largely as a result of the pandemic but it had established itself long before then, but I'm wondering if, much like Zoom, this is one where you had to be in this time last year to make decent money. Anyone else been weighing up Just Eat or added, or perhaps even removed, it from their portfolio in the last 12 months or so? 

Thrugelmir

Profitability isn't as great though.  Longer term you can see changes to the market (at least in the UK) if the trend continues. Which could result in less demand for Just Eat's services. 

Grenage

Aye, profitability with these types of businesses isn't great; it's not the sort of business I'd be looking to hold.

MaxiRobriguez

I'm not a fan either, not if you were buying in now anyway. As per above the profitability isn't great and there's more (developed) competition now in Deliveroo and Uber Eats. Some of the % cuts demanded by Just Eat are extortionate as well, 15-20% of price paid by the consumer. I suspect many takeaways will feel once they have extended their "brand" reach having used JE services for a bit and gained some customer loyalty, they may decide to go it alone. That's before considering the end of the pandemic will see many folk wanting to eat out in restaurants with friends again.

dunstonh

In our area, many restaurants have stopped using Just Eat as it was too expensive to them and ceased providing incremental orders but started to cannibalize their walk-in takeaway orders.     They now use their own-in house delivery people or share them on a local arrangement with other local restaurants.

HansOndabush

Cant see why anyone uses Just Eat; better to phone the take-away/restaurant direct.

JET are also loss-making; from the interims:

" Loss for the period ² was €158 million in the first six months of 2020, compared with a loss of €27 million in the first half of 2019."

Doesn't look good to me.

bowlhead99

HansOndabush said:

Cant see why anyone uses Just Eat; better to phone the take-away/restaurant direct.

Better if you want to give more money to the restauranteur rather than the middleman service, but no better for most practical purposes. 

It will depend on where you are in the country, as some do not have as much coverage from Just Eat / Deliveroo / Uber Eats.  If you are in a small town and there are only 3 takeaways and one is on Just Eat, one on Uber and one not on either, you might just be happy to have a flyer with the menu for each pinned up at home and then give them a call and walk round to collect it and get some fresh air while you're doing it.  If you are in a large city with myriad options, it's certainly handy to click the JE or Deliveroo or Uber site, get 167 restaurant options, click into the menu of the one you fancy, click on the food items you want, press Order (they already know our credit card info) and have it arrive at your door. 

These aggregator services that provide their own delivery crew are generally adding convenience. It doesn't strike me as 'better' to have 167 phone numbers and menus memorised, make a phone call, wait for someone to answer, have a conversation about what you'd like them to make for you and an estimate of when it might be ready, have them write it all down, put your shoes on and go out in the cold to collect it etc.  If the takeaway does offer a delivery option themselves, you have to find your credit card and read out all your private credit card info over the phone (or have a pile of cash ready for the delivery guy) etc; if the restaurant has their own website ordering engine you will need to register on it separately for every restaurant or just key all your details in fresh every time.  

When you pull out your phone and the option to find and order your food from the app is no more complex than finding and dialling the number of the restaurant, a lot of people will just use the app. I can totally see why people use it, and I use it myself (as well as Deliveroo and Uber).

However, I think the options for growth have inevitably slowed despite being almost 60% up on Q4 deliveries in 2020 vs previous year and having increased their own 'Just Eat hired driver' proportion of the sales mix.   The shares have been priced for aggressive growth, and I sold mine before the merger / takeover; the share price hasn't exactly gone through the roof over the last year despite takeaway food being a big thing across Europe these last 9 months.