Alexandru Arba
Research expert covering Japan
Food delivery of restaurants in Japan - statistics & facts
Food delivery has a long history in Japan. Wide-spread food delivery began with consumer cooperatives that offered community-based services, such as delivering food parcels to services subscribers. More recently, the spread of the internet and the ubiquitous use of smartphones created the necessary infrastructure for the diversification and evolution of food delivery. Japanese consumers today can choose from three options when it comes to food delivery: online grocery shopping (and delivery), periodical food parcel deliveries by local consumer cooperatives, and instant delivery of ready-to-eat food from restaurants.
Food delivery is becoming an increasingly important segment of the foodservice industry. Despite the adverse effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the foodservice industry as a whole, the market size of food delivery increased in recent years. Online grocery shopping and co-op food deliveries are the two largest segments of food delivery in Japan. However, the restaurant food delivery segment has expanded considerably in recent years, presumably prompted by the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic as demand soared in reaction to restrictions on mobility and safety concerns.
Specialized food delivery platforms, such as Demae-can and UberEats, are also present in the market and seek to provide consumers with fast, easy-to-understand and reliable services. To succeed, specialized food delivery platforms need to convince consumers, as well as restaurants, to make use of their services. The leading reasons that keep consumers in Japan from ordering food include the perceived high delivery costs and the fact that ordering food is more expensive than dining out.
Restaurant food delivery consumer behavior
Next to dining out and take-away, (some) restaurants also offer food delivery. Compared to the share of consumers who eat out or order take-away, the utilization rate of food delivery is relatively low. In Japan, younger age group cohorts constitute the main consumer base that use food delivery services, as utilization decreases with increasing age group. The most commonly ordered type of food is pizza. This is also reflected in the most commonly used food delivery service, which was Domino’s Pizza.Specialized food delivery platforms, such as Demae-can and UberEats, are also present in the market and seek to provide consumers with fast, easy-to-understand and reliable services. To succeed, specialized food delivery platforms need to convince consumers, as well as restaurants, to make use of their services. The leading reasons that keep consumers in Japan from ordering food include the perceived high delivery costs and the fact that ordering food is more expensive than dining out.
