The journey of Delivereat from startup to Teleport
Last August, Teleport signed an agreement to acquire local Malaysian online food delivery platform Delivereat. As part of the acquisition, Delivereat’s founders Leong Shir Mein and Tan Suan Sear joined the management team at Teleport and airasia digital. This piece was written by Shir Mein – where she shares her journey pioneering the first food delivery platform in Penang with her husband, challenges and learnings along the way – and the decisions behind the partnership with Teleport.
Sparking the Idea.
There came a time when I was looking for an adventure, something that I could call my own but I didn’t know what to do. Suan Sear, my husband, was extremely hardworking and ambitious; always ensuring that he took every opportunity to grow in his engineering career. To earn a little extra money, he lectured engineering subjects at INTI University and did insurance on the side. During whatever free time we had, we would talk about how we could make more money and there wasn’t any other way around it than venturing into a new business. So we started brainstorming, hung out with our friends to see what was hot in the market. Then there was this idea of selling physical vouchers valued at a high amount but sold at lower cost. Like groupon but the old school way of having it printed and selling the hard copies.
I was working in the advertising department at a newspaper publication company back then, and one of my portfolios was “Gourmet Guide”. It was a small column published in the newspaper weekly targeting local F&B operators. It was then when the idea sparked! We thought having an online advertisement platform for food operators would be more efficient – a platform that would be able to list pricing, display promos and measure sales volume on the platform. And thinking it through even more, the only way to measure sales volume in the most accurate manner is having to do its delivery fulfillment.
Back in 2012, there were no food delivery platforms in the market. There were a few small ones in KL but none in Penang. Everyone in Penang was used to ordering pizzas over the phone and online purchases were just starting on platforms like groupon.
The Birth of DeliverEat
We knew we wanted to start an online food delivery platform but, being in our 20s, both Suan Sear and I did not have the financial means. We had to secure some seeding funds and we heard from some friends that there were some government bodies giving out funds for ideation. We researched all the grants available in the market and that’s when we found the Cradle fund! We submitted our application with a business plan and a few weeks later we got a call and was invited for a presentation. From then, a few weeks passed and our funding was secured! It was just RM150,000, it wasn’t much but enough just to get things started.
At this point, food delivery was still so foreign and we wanted a name that would immediately explain what the business was about. We went through several and were contemplating between ClickEat (where it literally means you get to eat with a few clicks) and DeliverEat. We did a little more research online and we found out that another company in another country already acquired the name ClickEat. Without a second thought, we knew that DeliverEat was the choice and we went with it immediately.
We knew we wanted to start an online food delivery platform but being in our 20s, both Suan Sear and I did not have the financial means. We had to secure some seeding funds and we heard from some friends that some government bodies were giving out funds for ideation. We researched all the grants available in the market and that’s when we found the Cradle fund! We submitted our application with a business plan and a few weeks later we got a call and was invited for a presentation. A few weeks later, we’ve received confirmation on our funding of RM150,000, which wasn’t much but an exciting beginning to get things started!
Here’s where the fun part begins – naming the food delivery that will immediately explain what the business was all about. Contemplating between a few names in the process, we’ve finally landed on DeliverEat and knew in our hearts that this is what we wanted.
The Start of It All – Acquiring Merchants & Going Live
In order to stand out, we knew that getting reputable merchants was important. We spoke to more than 50 merchants during the ideation stage to find out what features were important for our tech. 2012 was the year of the bubble tea craze. We were determined to get the most popular bubble tea brand as our first merchant. why? It was a simple product that everyone loves and understood – it’s an addictive product and the brand collaboration would make us stand out.
For us to establish our brand, we knew that getting reputable merchants is crucial for the business. In this process, we’ve spoken to more than 50 merchants during the ideation stage to identify the elements and features that were relevant for our tech. In 2012, the market was raving about the bubble tea craze and we were determined to get the most popular bubble tea brand as our first merchant. The idea was simple, it was a product that everyone loved and understood. With our brand riding on the trend as a collaboration, it would’ve made us stand out in the crowd and help the business flourish!
We contacted Tealive (formerly known as Chatime), headed by Bryan Loo to have his brand onboarded. Byran was a nice guy. He listened to our pitch and gave the green light almost immediately!
We were overjoyed because recruiting subsequent brands would now be a whole lot easier.
Soon enough, the first few merchants and rider recruitment were done while both of us still had our full time jobs! It was not easy but we did it. However, we knew that in order to do this successfully, one of us would need to leave our current jobs. Both Suan Sear and I sat down, talked it through and I decided to resign because I was earning less than Suan Sear at that time.
Soon enough, the first few merchants and rider recruitment were done while both of us still had our full-time jobs! It was not easy but we did it. We knew that the success of this company would require one of us to leave our current jobs. After Suan Sear and I sat down for a discussion, I decided to resign because I was earning less than Suan Sear at that time.
With our starting merchant and riders, we were ready to go live and DeliverEat was officially launched on 15th October 2012!
The Beginning, The Ride and What We Learned.
Merchant recruitment was relatively easy, surprisingly. Many were interested to be on board! Keeping sales up was important too, the first few weeks, we were stationed at Chatime, handing out flyers and informing people about our brand. Operations were relatively smooth but having insufficient riders was an issue. We only had 2 riders and whenever there were more than 4 orders at a time, our orders would be delayed. Frequently I will spend lunch and dinner time on the road delivering orders.
As the months went by, we grew not just in our merchant base but also our riders, our customers and not to mention our team too! 10 months into launching DeliverEat, Suan Sear joined me full time and we both poured our heart and soul into this business we grew out of a RM150,00.00 funding.
To our surprise, merchant recruitment was relatively easy as many were interested to hop on board! In order for us to maintain sales figures, we were stationed at Chatime to hand out flyers and promote our brands within the first few weeks. Despite the operations that were running smoothly, we were still facing the issue of having insufficient riders.
With only 2 riders at that time, our orders would be delayed whenever it surpasses the number of riders we had at the moment. As a result, I will spend most of my lunch and dinner time on the road to deliver orders.
As the months went by, we’ve expanded not just our merchant base but also our riders, customer base, and not to mention our team too! As we marched into our 10th month of launching DeliverEat, Suan Sear joined me full-time and we both poured our heart and soul into this business that we grew out of the RM150,000 funding that was given to us in the beginning.
Of course, running the business wasn’t always a bed of roses. Despite having the first mover advantage, competitions came a couple months after we started. The biggest competition at that time was FoodPanda. Despite having significantly less funding, we continued to preserve and focus on what matters most – customer experience. Our number one rule was to ensure our deliveries to our customers were met on time no matter what.
Of course, running the business isn’t always a bed of roses. Despite having the first-mover advantage, our competitors joined the game a few months after we’ve started, and FoodPanda was our biggest competitor back then.
We continued to preserve and strive on what matters most, even though we faced difficulties in our funding. Nonetheless, we were determined to uphold our customer experience and maintain our number one rule – always ensure our deliveries to our customers were met on time, rain or shine!
As time passed by we learned a few things from running a food delivery business from scratch.
- Customer experience is the most important thing!
- Nothing matters more than on-time deliveries
- DO NOT fight on the same battleground as the more well-funded competitors.
- Fight to your own strengths – for us, we engaged more with hawker centers where getting a meal from them is very common in Penang.
- Fight to your own strengths – for us, we engaged more with hawker centers where getting a meal from them is very common in Penang.
- Listen to your customers.
- One thing that was sought after by our customers was to have a platform where they could combine their orders from different places. We analysed, we listened, and we provided this feature to our customers.
- Keep Innovating.
- Doing what we already know won’t cut it. We need to constantly explore uncharted territories, go beyond and dare to make the changes needed to grow the business.
- Doing what we already know won’t cut it. We need to constantly explore uncharted territories, go beyond and dare to make the changes needed to grow the business.
- Perseverance
- There were many times when people talked down to us – asking us to close our business because we are not big enough and would not make any impact. If we had listened to them, we would not be where we are today. We persevere through the hard times because they don’t last.
Teleporting Into The Future
Right before the start COVID-19, we were struggling to break even with the ongoing discount battles against the now many competitors in the market. We soon needed to figure out a way to maintain revenue without having to throw more discounts. Even though operationally, we were breaking even – it was the marketing that was wearing us down. As we were looking at the different means to improve, suddenly before we knew it, WHAMP! Covid happened. Sales started to soar again without the need to throw more discounts! We were profitable overnight!
Before the start of COVID-19, we were struggling to break even with the ongoing discount battles against the many competitors in the market. The marketing strategy was wearing us down even though we were breaking even operationally. As we were trying to improve the situation, WHAMP! COVID-19 happened and before we knew it, sales were soaring off the charts even without more discounts and we were profitable overnight.
Being profitable made a drastic change to our stress levels for sure! We were no longer chasing for funding, no longer at the mercy of having to find new investors. What we need to focus on now is to continue being profitable post MCO and then, post COVID-19. We were focused on purely on bringing in revenue and focused on driving more value for customers
Soon enough, we were greeted by Pete and Sabrina from Teleport. They reached out to us to have a chat.
To be honest, we didn’t know what the chat was for? But we had one anyway.
During the chat, Pete mentioned about players having to merge a couple of times and at the time we weren’t really sure if we understood him correctly. It was scary and also exciting at the same time because we actually have had FoodPanda and Grab visiting us and proposing mergers before but nothing ever really happened.
Being profitable made a drastic change to our stress levels for sure! We were no longer chasing for funding, no longer at the mercy of having to find new investors. The only thing we needed to focus on was to maintain our profit post-pandemic and also post COVID-19. We were focused and determined to increase our revenue and provide more value for our customers.
Soon enough, we were greeted by Pete and Sabrina from Teleport and they invited us for a chat. We didn’t know what the objective of the chat was for, but we agreed to it anyway!
During the chat, Pete mentioned players having to merge a couple of times and at the time we weren’t sure if we understood him correctly. It was scary and also exciting at the same time because we actually have had FoodPanda and Grab visiting us and proposing mergers before but nothing ever really happened.
But the more we spoke to Pete, the more we saw his sincerity and most of all the value in us merging. It was Pete’s leadership that made us feel that being part of Teleport would bring us to the next level. It was definitely something that we thought about long and hard and it was also very scary. But we believed in Pete and before we knew it, we said yes, signed the papers and now – we have merged with Teleport, the logistics venture of airasia Digital.
Now comes the next scary part. Being the newcomers into this big family tree, we hope that we will be able to bring value to both the teams at airasia and Teleport. We believe that the product, service and brand name that we have built lovingly for DeliverEat for the past nine years would be able to aid in the growth of Teleport. Both Suan Sear and I also hope to learn from airasia and Teleport on how to manage a business of a bigger scale. Something new, something different but also something very much exciting to be a part of.
The more we spoke to Pete, the more we saw his sincerity and most of all, the value in us merging. It was Pete’s leadership that made us feel that being part of Teleport would bring us to the next level. After we’ve given a lot of thought to it, we decided to take this bold, but courageous step to say yes! Pete has won us with his sincerity and his reassurance that it was the right choice and just like that, we have merged with Teleport, the logistics venture of airasia Digital.
Here’s where the scary yet exciting part begins! We’re excited to be the newcomers in this big family tree and we hope that we will be able to bring value to the team of both Teleport and airasia.
DeliverEat has been our blood, sweat, and tears for the past 9 years and we’re confident that our product and service will aid the growth of Teleport as a brand too! Both Suan Sear and I also hope to learn from airasia and Teleport on how to manage a business on a bigger scale. Something new, something different, but also something very much exciting to be a part of.
#To infinity and beyond!
If you’re a small business looking to expand and increase your customer loyalty and your business, come talk to us so we could help you kickstart your Teleport journey today. Get to know us a bit more here: https://www.teleport.asia/en/my
