Yes, you get to pick the recipes you want each week.
We kept hearing from our early users that they didn't have an hour to spend cooking every night. We knew that restaurants could fire any dish in 20 min, so we really focused on how to use the same techniques they do to make a 20-min dinner possible for home cooks without compromising on flavor. We're the only service that offers delicious, home-cooked meals in 20 mins or less.
I'm curious as to what your turnaround time from order to delivery is?
We actually tried something pretty similar last year here in Portland (the site is still alive at www.localplate.com although we have ceased operations), we found it pretty challenging just to get people to plan ahead far enough for our offering to be viable. (We came across some consumer research that something like 70% of households don't have a plan for dinner until sometime the same day.)
We eventually tried distribution through existing retail channels which definitely helped with the traction side but made the economics pretty challenging. :)
Best of luck though, it's an interesting space with a lot of people attacking it from different directions right now.
(E-mail is in my profile if you want to know any more about our experience.)
I wonder what this will actually look like in practice. Will they be sending subscribers restaurant-branded ingredients to make named dishes from their menus, will they be marketed as approximations, or just generic recipes?
We're working directly with the restaurants to create the meals. Often the restaurants make a key ingredient in their own kitchen. Other times they'll share the recipe with our chef and we do it.
What restaurants have mastered is how to prepare delicious meals quickly. Anything you order in a restaurant can be served in 20 mins or less. What we're doing is taking their techniques for making things fast and making them available to home cooks.
Smart team, who knows the food space well. Agree with Josh that sending all the ingredients is key, as well as finding great unique recipes that can be ordered (I assume) any time.
I'm curious how many of these kinds of services the market will bear - there seem to be quite a few clones now. And do they have staying power?
I think people are curious to see what they are all about, but I suspect this kind of food shopping experience will not change peoples behavior longterm.
I tried Blue Apron and was generally happy with the service, but canceled it because it put too many constraints on my week - I had to stay home and cook Monday - Wednesday or else the ingredients would perish.
The bigger issue for me though was packaging waste. I hate all the plastic crap that was generated out of a meal.
Clearly I'm biased, but I think we're only beginning to reimagine what a grocery store of the future will look like.
I totally feel you with regards to packaging waste. One of the key areas we've been focusing on in our beta is making sure our packaging is minimal. All the packaging we do send is reusable, biodegradable or recyclable.
We're a little different in that we actually send you everything you need to make the dish (minus salt, pepper & olive oil). Forage would be considerably less valuable to me if I still had to make the trek to the grocery store and deal with all the waste that goes along with that.
I'd be more excited if this was raw ingredients and not prepped ingredients. Prepping (at least for me) doesn't take all that much time; but running around different stores to get fresh ingredients does.
We'll still send you raw ingredients. This isn't about pre-chopped onions. It's more about the ingredients that take forever to make at home. Think more along the lines of fresh ramen noodles or pre-marinated meats.
Great idea and product! Where do you plan to source your ingredients and how much will the customers know about where the ingredients in their meals are coming from?
We're currently sourcing from some great distributers here in SF that give us really high quality ingredients. We talk a lot about the potential to bring transparency into the food chain, but we're still figuring out the best way to surface that information in our product.
Why not just to learn cook from scratch? Cooking for someone at home with restaurant pre-prepped ingredients is like ordering from McD and adding a mayonnaise to fries. If you can't make it, then learn to make it. Or go to restaurant that can make it.
Why don't you learn to program a compiler from scratch? If you can't code from bare metal, then learn to. Or outsource all your code to someone who can.
One thing that keeps me from cooking a lot of recipes is just not having all the pieces. After that there's the problem that pretty much everything comes in amounts too large so a lot of these pricey or rarely used ingredients just end up in one meal then spoil before they're used again. I'd like it even more if this service had the choice of just getting the ingredients delivered, or some level between ingredients and ready to fry/grill/saute/bake which is what it looks like they're providing.
I think the niche is pretty clear. There are obvious benefits to creating meals from scratch, but not everyone has the time, expertise, or even all the equipment. This service cuts down the time significantly, and sells the ingredients for you to assemble/cook yourself at what I would assume to be prices much less than actual restaurants.
It's not about trying to impress someone with your cooking skills or even learning how to cook, it's about getting restaurant quality freshly-made meals at home.
I think that's an unnecessarily negative viewpoint. There's still skill required to turn raw ingredients into a finished result - in this case, food. If it encourages more people to cook healthier food at home, then this is something that should be supported.
@Submitter: This looks fantastic, thanks for sharing!
[+] [-] cw3|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] joshfraser|11 years ago|reply
We kept hearing from our early users that they didn't have an hour to spend cooking every night. We knew that restaurants could fire any dish in 20 min, so we really focused on how to use the same techniques they do to make a 20-min dinner possible for home cooks without compromising on flavor. We're the only service that offers delicious, home-cooked meals in 20 mins or less.
[+] [-] scotje|11 years ago|reply
We actually tried something pretty similar last year here in Portland (the site is still alive at www.localplate.com although we have ceased operations), we found it pretty challenging just to get people to plan ahead far enough for our offering to be viable. (We came across some consumer research that something like 70% of households don't have a plan for dinner until sometime the same day.)
We eventually tried distribution through existing retail channels which definitely helped with the traction side but made the economics pretty challenging. :)
Best of luck though, it's an interesting space with a lot of people attacking it from different directions right now.
(E-mail is in my profile if you want to know any more about our experience.)
[+] [-] joshfraser|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] yock|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] joshfraser|11 years ago|reply
What restaurants have mastered is how to prepare delicious meals quickly. Anything you order in a restaurant can be served in 20 mins or less. What we're doing is taking their techniques for making things fast and making them available to home cooks.
[+] [-] andrewkitchell|11 years ago|reply
Seems like a cool mix of Blue Apron & Goldbely.
[+] [-] fowkswe|11 years ago|reply
I think people are curious to see what they are all about, but I suspect this kind of food shopping experience will not change peoples behavior longterm.
I tried Blue Apron and was generally happy with the service, but canceled it because it put too many constraints on my week - I had to stay home and cook Monday - Wednesday or else the ingredients would perish.
The bigger issue for me though was packaging waste. I hate all the plastic crap that was generated out of a meal.
[+] [-] joshfraser|11 years ago|reply
I totally feel you with regards to packaging waste. One of the key areas we've been focusing on in our beta is making sure our packaging is minimal. All the packaging we do send is reusable, biodegradable or recyclable.
[+] [-] tom3k|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] joshfraser|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] true_religion|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] joshfraser|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gravity13|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zkirill|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] joshfraser|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kandalf|11 years ago|reply
As a note for Josh, the banner image is unreadable when the window is maximized on my 30" thunderbolt display.
[+] [-] joshfraser|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] everettForth|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ameister14|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] joshfraser|11 years ago|reply
Here's the context for those who missed the story: http://fourhourworkweek.com/2014/07/21/harrys-prelaunchr-ema...
[+] [-] jzzskijj|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] soneca|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rtkwe|11 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Zikes|11 years ago|reply
It's not about trying to impress someone with your cooking skills or even learning how to cook, it's about getting restaurant quality freshly-made meals at home.
[+] [-] JustARandomGuy|11 years ago|reply
@Submitter: This looks fantastic, thanks for sharing!