Uber Eats’ Growth Strategy: Speed, Suburbs, and Self-Service
Photo Caption: Uber Eats just announced it will deliver to 70 percent of the U.S. population by the end of the year.
Skift Take
Uber Eats has proven its model is easily replicable in new markets, and it continues to increase its speed of growth. A new feature, just announced, aims to speed it up even more: now restaurants can sign up to work with Uber Eats on their own, no salesperson (or sales process) required.
Uber Eats will expand to cover 70 percent of the U.S. population by the end of the year. The expansion will also double the number of cities Eats covers, year over year. Much of the expansion comes in smaller cities and suburbs, according to Janelle Sallenave, head of Uber Eats, U.S. & Canada.
"This means we’re able to get into cities like Eugene, Oregon or Cedar Rapids, Iowa — cities that you don't historically think about for the [Uber] rideshare business," Sallenave said.
This suburban expansion is par for the course at delivery companies. Last month at Skift Restaurants Forum, Stan Chia, Grubhub's chief operating officer, explained his company's push into newer markets. "What we continue to see is that we’ve built a marketplace that really allows for reinforcement. This is a model that works for everybody. One of our big things is we have to make s
