The tempting launch
A café owner already serves walk-in lunches. Customers now ask for home delivery, and online ordering makes expansion seem easy. The owner considers offering the full menu at existing prices. The assumption is that a successful café menu will also support a viable delivery business. That could turn more orders into more losses.
Follow one paid order
Consider one hypothetical pilot; every figure here is illustrative, not a reported result. The owner adds home delivery without changing the menu. For order D17, the customer pays €12. Ingredients and packaging cost €5, the courier charges €4, and extra kitchen overtime costs €4. The order produces €12 of revenue but minus €1 of contribution: money left after costs caused by that order, before rent and other fixed costs.
Here, preparing several dishes to order pushes packing past the scheduled shift, triggering overtime. Dispatching each order separately also incurs a fresh courier charge. Customers bought the meal; their purchase did not make this delivery method profitable.
Test a different operating plan
The owner next tests a limited lunch menu with a shared preparation window and grouped deliveries. Savings count only if the actual costs fall.
For each delivery run, total customer payments after refunds; subtract ingredients, packaging, the courier bill and extra labour paid. If the result is zero or negative, change the price, menu or delivery arrangement before expanding. Compare each promised and actual arrival time, too. Late meals fail the delivery promise even when the run earns a contribution. Hold expansion if either check fails. A pilot passing both checks still needs enough orders to cover fixed costs.
When the full menu can work
Hypothetical boundary: a nearby office prepays full-menu lunches for one scheduled drop at its kitchenette. Existing staff can prepare them without overtime or delaying walk-ins. Keep that menu if the run covers additional costs, contributes toward fixed costs and arrives as promised.