Food delivery platform Zomato’s recently relaunched loyalty program Gold has onboarded over nine lakh members in a month, the company said. Announcing the financial results for the quarter ended December 31, 2022, Zomato said it expects Gold to be a profitable program in the long term.
“The new Gold program is built on top of what we have learnt over the last few years – iterating on feedback we have received from customers, restaurant partners, as well as investors. We think that the new program is more sustainable for customers, restaurant partners, as well as our P&L. We expect this program to drive loyalty and higher frequency of ordering going forward,” Zomato CEO Deepinder Goyal wrote in a letter to shareholders.
Relaunched in January, Gold program offers a bunch of benefits to its users including free delivery, no delay guarantee and special access during rush hours. The program is priced at Rs 149 for three months.
The company has not announced an annual subscription plan. Under the new plan, members will receive unlimited free deliveries at all restaurants under 10 km distances or orders above Rs 199; Rs 100 coupons for delayed orders for orders with ‘no delay guarantee’, and additional offers of up to 30 per cent on delivery and up to 40 per cent flat off on dining at over 25,000 restaurant partners.
“The key highlight of Zomato Gold is ‘On Time Guarantee’. This feature was three years in the making, and the tech which powers this feature is a significant achievement for our team….We have also made our intercity delivery from legendary restaurants (called Intercity Legends) exclusively available to Gold members. And of course, free delivery on orders meeting certain criteria,” Goyal said.
The company said it is working on remodeling the 10-minute delivery service ‘Zomato Instant’ to offer home-style cooked meals at affordable prices. The service will be called ‘Zomato Everyday’.
“We believe that this is a large opportunity in a market like India and is relatively untapped currently. We plan to launch this soon in the next few weeks,” Goyal wrote in his letter.
The company had dismissed reports of ‘Instant’ being shut down in January and said it is rebranding the business.
Zomato’s net loss widened to Rs 347 crore in the third quarter of FY23 against Rs 63.2 crore in the year-ago period. The company’s revenue rose 75 per cent to Rs 1,948 crore as compared to Rs 1,112 crore in Q3FY22.
On Thursday, the company’s scrip on BSE closed trading 0.5 per cent higher at Rs 54.60. Zomato said its core earnings briefly turned positive in January, helped by an increase in orders due to festivals and FIFA World Cup.