French startup Taster has raised a $37 million Series B funding round from Octopus Venture, Battery Ventures, LocalGlobe, HeartCore, Rakuten, GFC and Founders Future. The company operates dozens of restaurants that only exist on food delivery platforms. You can’t book a table as there is no table.
Taster has been focusing on five street food-inspired concepts so far — Bian Dang (Taiwanese food), A Burgers (plant-based burgers), Mission Saigon (Vietnamese food), Out Fry (Korean food) and Stacksando (Japanese street food). After that, Taster has opened dozens of kitchens across 40 different cities and listed its kitchens on food delivery platforms, such as Deliveroo and Uber Eats.
Essentially, the startup wants to build new restaurant chains for the 21st century. Instead of opening brick-and-mortar restaurants, Taster focuses on food delivery as it’s still a booming segment. In Paris, Taster restaurants are the third restaurant group on Deliveroo behind McDonald’s and Burger King — it represents over 5,000 meals per day.
After operating its own kitchens, Taster now wants to partner with existing restaurants that don’t get a lot of orders on Deliveroo or Uber Eats. Taster brings its own native brands and menus as well as its tech tools.
Taster has built its own delivery app for Android and iOS. But you can still find Taster’s restaurants on third-party platforms. The startup doesn’t want to reinvent the wheel and replace food ordering platforms. But it makes sense to offer its service to end customers directly.
As Taster brands become more and more familiar, it should create demand from day one — restaurants can expect between €4,000 and €6,000 in revenue during the first week. By 2025, Taster wants to operate in 1,000 cities thanks to this partnership model.
Image Credits: Taster