Zomato Launches ‘Pure Veg Fleet’ To Cater To Vegetarian Customers

Foodtech giant Zomato has launched a delivery fleet called ‘Pure Veg Fleet’ and a new mode on its app called ‘Pure Veg Mode’ to cater to customers with 100% vegetarian dietary preference.

Zomato founder and CEO Deepinder Goyal took to X (formerly Twitter) to make the announcement.

“India has the largest percentage of vegetarians in the world, and one of the most important feedback we’ve gotten from them is that they are very particular about how their food is cooked, and how their food is handled,” he said in a post, adding that the new launches are aimed at catering to such customers

The Pure Veg Mode will consist of a curation of restaurants that serve only pure vegetarian food and will exclude all restaurants which serve any non-vegetarian food item.

Meanwhile, Pure Veg Fleet will only serve orders from these pure vegetarian restaurants. This means that a non-vegetarian meal or a vegetarian meal served by a non-vegetarian restaurant will not be served by this fleet.

Goyal said that the new feature and fleet will see a phased roll out across the country in the next few weeks.

“In the future, we plan to add more specialised fleets for special customer needs. For example, there’s a special cake delivery fleet coming up with hydraulic balancers which prevent your cake from getting smudged during delivery,” he added.

The development comes a day after Goyal, while speaking during the ongoing ‘Startup Mahakumbh’, said that startups need to constantly innovate as no business model can last for more than a decade today amid the rapid evolution of technology.

The new launches are also part of Zomato’s series of experiments with new services and features. Earlier this year, the startup launched a daily payout feature for select restaurants and also said it was eyeing 100% deliveries via electric vehicles by 2033.

Zomato is also setting up a plant for processing value-added food supplies, including, sauces, spreads, pre-cut and semi-finished perishable products, for its Hyperpure vertical.

Zomato posted its third consecutive profitable quarter in Q3 FY24, reporting a profit after tax of INR 138 Cr. Its profit stood at INR 36 Cr in the preceding quarter.

On the back of this, the startup’s share price has surged over 25% year to date. Earlier this week, Jefferies said Zomato is one of its ‘top picks’ for the next five years and expects the stock to surge to INR 400 during this period.

Shares of Zomato ended today’s trading session 0.13% lower at INR 158 on the BSE.