The past decade has seen its share of attempts to optimize or "simplify" the act of acquiring food — from the customer's perspective, anyway. Delivery app proliferation has fundamentally changed not only diners' expectations but also how restaurants are forced to operate; there's no breaking our reliance on delivery apps now, despite everything we know about them. (I, for one, am personally part of this problem.) For other supposed innovations, like food halls and delivery-only ghost kitchens, the long-term viability is still tbd — the public is no longer clamoring for the food hall experience, with a few high-profile ones shuttering of late, while ghost kitchens have always fought perceptions that they are cynical shells designed solely to maximalize profit. (They're also on the decline.) So, can the real disrupter in the space be something that mashes up parts of all of the above? Kristen Hawley talks to chefs involved with Wonder, a delivery app that began as a service that would send par-cooked delivery meals to the suburbs, and then have a cook in the van finish preparing the ordered dishes a la minute. (Truly an innovation, if one that was completely unsustainable.) Coverage seems bullish on Wonder and its billionaire founder, but do people want what's essentially a takeout-first food hall, or a ghost kitchen with a public footprint that pays big-name chefs for their IP and their hearty public endorsements? Could its play to target the suburbs fill an actual need in those areas? The chefs Hawley speaks to are certainly among the converted, but read on to decide for yourself: Is Wonder the kind of food delivery that we — the diners hopelessly dependent on apps — are actually craving? Additional links: - In 2022, my colleague Jaya Saxena attended a conference where the companies clamoring to disrupt delivery unveiled their true ids. I think about this moment when a delivery drone enters to "Ride of the Valkyries" all the time.
- Meet Tony Illes, a Seattle resident embarking on a one-man effort to deliver outside the apps entirely.
- I loved this photo essay in Rest of World that gives a glimpse of daily life for delivery and gig workers around the world. —Erin DeJesus, executive editor
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