Deliveroo’s product leader has said that there are opportunities to rebuild parts of its app as the company expands its grocery delivery service across the UK.

Traditionally a food delivery platform for restaurants, grocery delivery now makes up 12 per cent its business, with the company serving customers from some of Britain’s largest supermarkets and convenience stores.

“We actually do more grocery deliveries a week than Ocado,” said Paul Wilkinson at the Retail Technology Show at Olympia, London.

Wilkinson, who has also previously worked at Amazon and Tesco Labs, explained that because the app is formatted for restaurants, it is now dealing with “menus” that offer up to 10,000 items.

He explained that this means the company has faced “tech debt” due to nobody having anticipated when developing the platform that a standard menu would need this much space.

“There are opportunities here to rebuild stuff,” he said.

Wilkinson said that when it comes to innovation, retailers should carve out time for employees or teams to “think about the future”.

He added that companies should “stay close to the business”, saying that a trendy office in Shoreditch filled with people that don’t know anything about the business doesn’t work.

“Prioritise ruthlessly,” Wilkinson told attendees of the exhibition and conference, also highlighting the importance of experimentation.

“Have space for failure,” he added, explaining that without failed projects companies aren’t really experimenting.

Wilkinson continued: “Pick things that will have the biggest impact on customers”.

Grocery via voice technology

Wilkinson also said that he believes that grocery orders are perfect for voice technology like Alexa because of the “connection to customers”.

But he warned that discovery can be really difficult, with it hard for customers to understand the capabilities of the technology.

He also highlighted that it difficult to personalise on a significant scale because while supermarkets and loyalty cards have plenty of customer data, Amazon doesn’t have the same level of information.

The Retail Technology Show is taking place at Kensington Olympia, London on 26 and 27 April 2023.

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