Delivery app commission is eating your margin. Move your regulars to direct orders
The apps are good at finding you a new guest. They are an expensive way to feed the same guest for the tenth time.
ATBy Ashish TiwariWriter, YUVAVI POS
The order you pay for twice
Paying a commission on a first order is paying for an introduction, and that can be worth it: the guest had never heard of you. Paying the same commission on the tenth order from the same household is paying to be introduced to somebody you already know.
Do the sum with your own numbers. If the app keeps a quarter of a ₹500 order, that is ₹125 an order before packaging, the discounts you co-fund and the payment fee. A regular who orders once a week is then worth more than ₹6,000 a year to the app — for a relationship that is, by now, entirely yours.
Do not leave the apps. Split the work
Delisting to save commission usually loses more than it saves, because the apps are genuinely where new guests find you. The goal is narrower: the apps do discovery, and your own channel does the repeat orders.
Read your contract before you price anything. Some agreements limit how much cheaper a dish may be elsewhere, and the cleaner lever is rarely a lower price anyway. It is a better experience: faster confirmation, the same person answering every time, the regular's usual order remembered.
Give the regular an easier way than the app
Nobody switches channels to save you money. They switch because the new way is less effort than the old one.
- A card in every delivery bag with a QR code that opens your own menu, not a PDF
- Your WhatsApp number on the bill, with a reason to save it: order updates and a quicker reorder
- Reordering in two taps — the last order shown first
- UPI on the confirmation, so payment is not a second conversation
What has to work before you ask anyone
A direct order that goes wrong sends the guest back to the app for good, so the plumbing comes before the promotion.
- Direct orders reach the kitchen on the same screen as dine-in and app orders — never on a second tablet somebody has to watch
- A delivery answer for every address you accept: your own rider or a local courier, with a time you can keep
- The menu and prices kept in one place, so the direct menu is never out of date
- Every direct guest saved with their phone number, which is the list the apps never hand over
Questions people ask
How can restaurants cut delivery app commission?
Move repeat guests to direct channels — WhatsApp, your own QR or website order — with the same menu and kitchen flow, so you keep the margin the aggregator would take.
Should a restaurant leave Swiggy or Zomato completely?
Most keep aggregators for discovery and shift regulars to direct ordering over time. Cutting commission is about mix, not an overnight switch-off.