Olo, a company best known for powering restaurants' digital ordering behind the scenes, is launching a consumer delivery app nationwide on Android and iOS. Its pitch is simple: no menu markups. While major delivery platforms charge restaurants commissions of 20 to 30 percent per order, Olo's founder and CEO Noah Glass says restaurants offset those costs by raising prices for app users. On Olo, restaurants charge the same prices as in-store, and the service fee is a flat 5 percent, plus delivery fees.
The app also removes sponsored listings, a common annoyance on rival platforms. Instead, users see a straightforward list of nearby restaurants available on Olo, along with past items for easy reordering. The launch includes 250 brands, with plans to expand.
Olo is not new to the food-ordering space. Glass founded a text-message ordering startup in 2005 that eventually became Olo, a backend software provider helping restaurants process menus across websites, apps, and kiosks. The company says it now assists with more than 3.5 million orders daily. Whether that infrastructure and industry credibility can persuade consumers to switch from entrenched delivery apps remains to be seen, but Olo is betting that lower, more predictable costs will be the draw.