Discover the different formats of this business model focused on delivery
A expansion of delivery In recent years, it has brought a new business model to food entrepreneurs: dark kitchens. Instead of having a counter or room to welcome the public, this restaurant consists of a kitchen optimized to only serve delivery orders.
The advantage of opening a dark kitchen is not only having a lower fixed cost — as there is no need for customer service staff and the commercial location is cheaper than on expensive shopping streets or in shopping malls. Adopting this business model is a strategy that allows you to explore new territories in the city, following the increase in demand for delivery of certain types of meals.
In some cases, even existing restaurants rent dark kitchens at strategic points, which allow them to deliver orders to a larger audience. In others, businesses are already prepared to operate solely as delivery.
There are also multi-brand dark kitchens, in which the same food company offers different types of cuisine, and the dishes are prepared in a shared kitchen, to optimize operational costs.
This is the strategy of Simple Kitchen, a network of multi-brand dark kitchens created in 2020 in São Paulo (SP), which delivers a variety of cuisines — ranging from the beloved burger to salads, according to the demands of each region.
In addition, the company rents kitchens to restaurants and industries that want to operate in this model to serve a wider audience. In these partnerships, Cozinha Simples provides the kitchen for the restaurant to operate with its team or provides the labor necessary to run the kitchen in the delivery operation.
To make the most of the structure, entrepreneurs Alan Pedroso and André Piva, founders of the business, also plan to operate with a white label, offering their own production to other brands. The dark kitchen format, for them, is expanding.
“The growth of delivery will continue for the next few years, even if at a slower pace than we saw during the pandemic”, says Alan, adding that the company ended 2021 with 4 units and 17 virtual stores.
Expanding burger restaurant
Operating in the dark kitchen system was also the option of Maikon Rangel, from the burger restaurant Just Burger, from São Paulo (SP). “I chose to be 100% delivery and it worked out really well. Before opening, we did a study and saw that where we wanted to operate there was not much quality in delivery”, says Maikon.
After opening the first unit in 2018, he saw sales grow by 100% in the first year and decided to open more dark kitchens: one in São Bernardo (SP), in 2021, and another in Guarulhos (SP), in 2022. “With the pandemic, the demand for food at home grew a lot, and we rode this wave”, he says.
For him, the trend of dark kitchens has been consolidating. “I believe this is the best scenario”, says the entrepreneur, who currently has 60 employees in the units, which started employing 12 people in 2018. “Now I'm thinking about opening a lounge, but as a test, because customers are asking for a lot. But all of our branches are focused on delivery.”
