Restaurants chew on old tricks as aggregators bite

Small outlets, chains reviving an older playbook: flyers, phone orders and in-house delivery

- Vaishnavi Kasturil & Sakshi Sadashiv

For restaurant owners, the math of food delivery has become tougher to swallow. With Swiggy and Zomato forming a near-duopoly and charging commissions of up to 30%, little is left on the table, pushing small outlets and even chains to revive old-school playbooks: flyers, phone or WhatsApp orders and in-house delivery, all while staying visible on the aggregator platforms they can’t afford to quit.

Bengaluru’s well-known eatery Paradise Biryani runs its own fleet for bulk orders even while listing on Swiggy and Zomato—sweetening direct deliveries with discounts of up to 40%. In Mumbai’s Versova, old favourites such as The Stomach send staff to leave their takeout menus on doors of neighbour homes, and offers 20-30% off.

Take a Bengaluru restaurant owner who listed on Zomato and Swiggy. Between October 2024 and June 2025, the outlet notched up nearly ₹4 lakh in sales on Zomato. But once commissions and charges were shaved off, barely ₹1.55 lakh—or less than 40%—landed in the restaurant's account.

The owner, who requested anonymity, admitted he knows he’s losing money on every order. Even so, he won't delist from Swiggy or Zomato, because, for now, that’s where the customers are.