Deliveroo's losses widened to £320m before pandemic boost

Deliveroo says on-demand grocery delivery is now the fastest-growing part of its business after the pandemic helped it recover from ongoing losses.

The food courier firm began partnering with supermarkets including Waitrose, Aldi, Morrisons and Co-op in 2020.

It now works with more than 1,500 grocery partners, including single-site local stores, delivering from 4,300 sites globally.

Accounts filed for Deliveroo’s parent company Roofoods show its operating losses widened from £257m to £320m in 2019 before the pandemic helped push it towards recovery.

Deliveroo said the rise in demand for its services during the coronavirus shutdown meant it was profitable at an operating level for more than six months in 2020.

Over 46,000 restaurants joined the platform last year, and the company now works with more than 140,000 restaurant partners globally.

It also doubled the number of riders it works with to 110,000 across 12 markets worldwide .

Deliveroo expects to more than double the number of its Editions ‘dark kitchens’ worldwide.

Writing in its accounts, founder Will Shu said he anticipated that the pandemic will have a ‘long-lasting’ impact on the business and restaurants.

“The social landscape is significantly different, and the culture of eating out will likely not revert to the way it was pre-Covid for some time,” he wrote.

Shu said this could result in "fewer restaurant partners and changes to people’s eating habits that could change the pattern of our income".

He added that Roofoods had a diverse workforce and there were concerns its could be affected by changes to immigration rules after Brexit.

“Furthermore, the availability of riders could be a concern. If this became an issue for the company, we would need to consider our marketing efforts to attract riders," he added.

Deliveroo was founded by Shu and Greg Orlowski in London in 2013.

Its global markets include Australia, Belgium, France, Hong Kong, Italy, Ireland, Netherlands, Singapore, Spain, United Arab Emirates and Kuwait.

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