NRAI Ties-up With Dotpe To Offer Contactless Dining; Take On Zomato, Dineout

The National Restaurant Association of India (NRAI), in partnership with Dotpe, is set to launch ‘Contactless Dining’ setting for consumers to minimise human touchpoints.

With this, Gurugram-based Dotpe is now competing against foodtech majors like Zomato and Dineout as well as fintech giant Paytm which has recently announced ‘Contactless Dining’ for the post-Covid world.

Dotpe’s move is likely to instil confidence in consumers who face a dilemma going out to dine due to the coronavirus outbreak. The restaurant industry is one of the major segments suffering massive losses as they have been forced to suspend the dine-in option by the government.

How Does Dotpe’s Contactless Dining work?

After the lockdown ends, NRAI will distribute Dotpe’s QR codes to all the restaurant partners. Using a QR code, diners will be able to access the menu of a restaurant. They can add food items to the cart and pay for it online while sitting at a table inside the restaurant.

The QR-based digital commerce and payments solution is also expected to help restaurant-partners to connect to the customers over WhatsApp. NRAI said this will help restaurants to build their own omni-channel digital platform. “In this process, restaurants will be able to own the customer completely,” NRAI was quoted as saying by Livemnint.

President of NRAI Anurag Katriar said that while NRAI spearheaded this initiative, this solution will benefit the entire food and beverage (F&B) fraternity at large, benefitting lakhs of small restaurants across the country.

Shailaz Nag, founder of Dotpe, added that the collaboration will help restaurants to stay transparent with the customers by communicating with them directly through WhatsApp for all online orders. “There’s no need for customers to download any additional app as they can start ordering food by simply scanning a QR code,” he added.

NRAI’s restaurant partners are expected to use the digital ordering services at a low flat fee instead of per order commission. The technology is to be used by restaurants like Haldiram’s, Social, Smoke House Delhi, Cafe Delhi Heights and Fab Café.

Is NRAI Taking Restaurants Away From Zomato, Swiggy

Besides launching the contactless dining option for restaurants, the NRAI is also working on ways to reduce their dependence on online food aggregators Zomato and Swiggy.

Several members of the restaurant association, over a Facebook Live session, noted key steps such as incorporating a loyalty program while simultaneously working on alternate home delivery models.

This isn’t the first time when NRAI has tried to drive restaurants aways from platforms like Zomato and Swiggy. Earlier, NRAI along with a few restaurants, in August 2019, started the logout campaign which led restaurants to withdraw their participation from Zomato’s Gold and Dineout’s Gourmet Passport.

NRAI said that it was worried about the trend of several key decision-making getting gradually usurped by these new-age ‘digital landlords’. The restaurant body is also seeking a singular right over customer data for the business owners and not the marketplace owners.