8 ms·

The daily lunch delivery of India's dabbawallahs

143 points by ultrasaurus 15y ago

Cherian_Abraham 15y ago
NYT wrote a pretty good article a while ago on these guys: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/29/business/worldbusiness/29lunch.html http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/29/business/worldbusiness/29l...
rokhayakebe 15y ago
I am sure some techies are thinking "I can write software to optimize this system and increase their revenue/profit. I will not charge them for the software, and will make money from the money they save.....". Just ensure your software can guarantee an accuracy rate close to theirs.
- eru 15y ago
  I bet they are employing mobile phones now.
  - deleted 15y ago
    [deleted]
  - deleted 15y ago
    [deleted]
  - DufusM 15y ago
    I doubt if the majority of them do, but you are totally right, there is very high cell phone penetration in India. Cell phones with some basic software could help them a lot.
  - kamaal 15y ago
    That is already there from a long time. Mobile phone charges have become dirt cheap. Sometimes free calls to some 10 numbers, billed per second(1ps per second). There are pre paid cards. For even 25 rupees(25 cents). You can even avail internet access for a day! From some carriers. I hope you are getting a glimpse of how messy the market is here.
trickjarrett 15y ago
I'm reading "The Starfish and the Spider" right now, though I'm early into the book, this system fascinates me. I find the illiteracy which both videos touched on equally fascinating as the system evolved around the workers' abilities rather than finding workers able to fit the system.
marcamillion 15y ago
It is things like this, why I love capitalism. Not getting into a political debate, but which other economic system known to man, could allow a system to be created that is more efficient than better capitalized rivals (read FedEx, UPS, DHL) and all packages delivered by people that are illiterate. I think it is easy to underestimate the logistical challenges of delivering food to 175,000 people all over a city when you have never tried it. As someone that has worked with a friend try to coordinate lunch orders for just 100 - 200 clients (including buying enough ingredients so there isn't waste, to collecting all orders in time, to delivering lunches on time), let me assure this is no easy feat. The most ironic thing though is that I think that if you were to plot a graph between the number of customers you have and how easy it is, I think you would see that it initially starts a in dip (i.e. delivering and serving lunch for 1 - 10 people is relatively easy, but as you go up to say 500 people complexity blows up and efficiency - on every scale - plummets) and then after you reach some local maxima (when you are able to afford more people and better systems from the revenues) efficiency starts to pick up again and the graph goes up and to the right. God bless the free market - wherever it is!
- anonymous246 15y ago
  These guys only DELIVER pre-packed lunch boxes. Somebody in the lunch-eaters' HOUSE makes the food and it's picked up from there and delivered to the lunch-eater. This is not a catering service (hence the part of of your comment about procuring food doesn't apply).
  - marcamillion 15y ago
    Errr....that makes it even more impressive. Because not only do they have to get lunch to 175,000 people, they also have to pick it up! You are right, I glossed over that fact. I was just using my experience as a vague point of reference for how complicated such a business is - even though on the outside it seems like it might be simple.
    - rdtsc 15y ago
      > Errr....that makes it even more impressive. It is the opposite for me. How bad would it have to get for me to run around in the rain on a bicycle to deliver someone's home-cooked lunch to their office? Pretty bad. I would have to be pretty deep in poverty before I would start considering that. I guess one person looks at this as the triumph of free enterprise, another looks at it as how desperate the situation can get for some. If it is the only job they can get and they have hungry children at home, you bet they will get that 6 sigmas of reliability...
potatolicious 15y ago
Having grown up in Asia before moving to the West, I've always wondered why we accept such shoddy excuses for lunch around here. You've got limp, cold sandwiches, or reheated leftovers in tupperwares. Or you spend a pretty dime on some nice, real food by eating out. Where I grew up, lunchboxes are small, but elaborate - food is neatly compartmentalized like in the article, and just about every place has a steamer to heat it up without the use of microwaves (aka the dessicator).
- rdtsc 15y ago
  I started bringing lunch to work recently. At home we can cook lunch that is cheaper, healther and tastier than most things I would get around where work. It is only a matter of making a little extra to have for the next day or make larger pot on the weekend. However one thing that is lost is experience of eating together if you are the only one bringing lunch. We just talked about that recently and that it not be under-estimated as far as I am concerned. There is important gossip being discussed, and in general I chatting with coworkers about random (non-work related) stuff. Sometimes I would even eat my lunch then still decide to walk with them and walk back just for fun if the weather is nice.
- radicaldreamer 15y ago
  What you're seeing is a low standard of living in action. There's enough surplus labor in India to deliver food from homes to offices everyday. You could do this in the US as well- but be prepared to pay however much labor and transportation costs. Average productivity in the US is also much higher than in India (that's why wages are higher), but Americans are no more productive when delivering and preparing this kind/quality of food, so this is unaffordable and you have to settle for lower quality lunches (or be willing to pay more).
  - potatolicious 15y ago
    I wasn't talking about food delivery - where I grew up you packed your own lunches, but generally people had much better food for lunch than what you'd see in your average North American office. Employers/schools also took more care in providing the equipment/facilities to heat and cook lunches (far in excess of microwaves, anyhow). It really speaks to a cultural difference - I feel that fast food culture has trained Americans to tolerate crappy food for lunch (or splurging on eating out). Lunch on a work day is not something to be savored, but rather something to be done with. IMHO there's something America can stand to learn here.
jessedhillon 15y ago
Does anyone else think it's ironic that a company called "Design Within Reach" sells tiffins for $85, which even in America could be had for $20. (And in India, perhaps $10-15)
- alexg0 15y ago
  I been to that store, it's a high end furniture store. Nothing there is 'within reach' for most people, or particularly good value.
- sid0 15y ago
  > (And in India, perhaps $10-15) More like $4-10, depending on the quality.
- spatulon 15y ago
  The point of Design Within Reach is not to sell well-designed products at low prices, but to sell well-designed products (mainly furniture) that would otherwise be impossible to buy through normal retail channels. "Within reach" refers to availability, not affordability.
blocke 15y ago
Fascinating article and videos. Thanks for sharing. Chaotic yet organized systems like this fascinate me.
stevoski 15y ago
Definitely fascinating. Don't forget, however, that many of these Mumbai dabbawallahs live a precarious existence. Perhaps the fear of homelessness and hunger encourage the high success rate. This is not a model I'd like to replicate in my own business.
- stretchwithme 15y ago
  Yeah, the last thing you want to do is give poor people opportunity.
ajju 15y ago
The "high end tiffin set" linked from the article costs $85. You could probably buy it for under $20 at your local Indian grocery store. If you are in a large city it's quite likely within 10 miles of where you live/work.
- brianbreslin 15y ago
  are all tiffin sets metal? i'm pretty sure i've seen similar concept bento box stacks that are plastic.
  - hartror 15y ago
    Yeah I almost clicked buy until I thought "How will I reheat these, microwaves will not like these!"
    - kamaal 15y ago
      So now do you understand why tiffin boxes are made of metal. Not that microwaves can't work with plastics or all sorts of plastics. But because most people in India can't afford to buy a microwave at the first place.
      - intended 15y ago
        We have plastic bowls for use in my office, and a micro. As do most of the other offices - I am in Mumbai, and a micro isn't that hard to afford for the middle class and many firms. That said, there are a lot of other people who eat their food cold. This is India, so for whatever N=true, N'=true
  - kamaal 15y ago
    Near the villages and country side most of it metal. Most due to high durability. But in Metro's Plastic is pretty famous and is widely used. Its in our culture to carry tasty food cooked by moms to schools/offices. But it seems like that culture is changing big time. McDonalds et al, have started offering good enough meals for 40 rupees onwards(less than $1 approx). Having said that, 40 rupees very unaffordable for a lunch meal. Even for a software engineer. Dining in all these McDonalds sort of restaurants is considered as for rich people.
srean 15y ago
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N25inoCea24 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N25inoCea24 youtube video of a TED talk by the president of Mumbai Dabbawala Education Centre. Closed captioning would have helped non-indian viewers, this commentary on the video might help http://www.hindu.com/mp/2011/03/14/stories/2011031451160400.htm http://www.hindu.com/mp/2011/03/14/stories/2011031451160400....
blackRust 15y ago
First as mentioned Indian meals take time to cook and there is a strong emphasis on home cooked meals. There is social stigma involved in carrying the tiffin case back. The workforce for the dhabbawallas is cheap and they live on a fairly low income. The way I understand it only a certain caste are dhabbawallas (correct me if I'm wrong). Even though the number of deliveries is huge, the people being delivered earn considerably more than the dhabbawallas, they all have office jobs. Having lived and experienced the Indian mechanism of things I am always impressed when this story resurfaces, but unfortunately knowing India I am very skeptical. They no doubt excel at what they do, but I would take the statistics with a grain of salt. Ask yourself how it is possible to measure such performance? The entire mechanism is so informal and excludes any 'reporting' (in the sense of data about efficiency) and is focused purely on delivery. I know a lot of "certified" companies in India that lack basic factory security, hygiene and protocols: they would fail a "real" certification.
- DufusM 15y ago
  I do not follow - isn't it all the more amazing that poorly paid, uneducated workers without proper salaries are able to achieve this? I would measure their performance by inserting random 'canary tiffins' over a period and measuring their loss percentage. You could also track some individual carriers and get a similar measure to combine into the previous metric.
- Indyan 15y ago
  A lot of things emerging from India aren't what they appear to be (eg. The $35 tablet). However, this bit is true. It's slightly hard to believe, but the dabbawallahs have been elaborately studied and covered by lots of esteemed organizations and publications. Btw, the dabbawallahs have a big admirer in Prince Charles.They were even invited to the Charles-Camilla wedding. http://www.mid-day.com/news/2011/apr/270411-dabbawallas-mumbai-prince-william-kate-middleton-royal-wedding.htm http://www.mid-day.com/news/2011/apr/270411-dabbawallas-mumb...
- kamaal 15y ago
  >>The workforce for the dhabbawallas is cheap and they live on a fairly low income. The way I understand it only a certain caste are dhabbawallas (correct me if I'm wrong). You need to understand the way this system works. In India the smaller cities and towns have virtually no opportunities if you want to financially well off. There fore the metros are flocked. When such a large population of people gather at a city. There are huge opportunities for anything and everything. Tiffin delivery system is one such opportunity. You will see many other things in India. Roadside Coffee, tea and cigarette vendors. In the US you people buy everything in super markets. But here vegetables are sold by people who wander street by street selling vegetables on push carts. Heck there is even a market for people who take care of your slippers when you leave them behind while entering a temple/mosque. Even though what they earn is very meager and may be nothing. But at least they have some means through which they can fill their stomachs. So dabbawallah's may be earning purely on basis of volumes alone.
buckwild 15y ago
I totally remember seeing these dudes when I visited India. Dabbawallah roughly translates to "box guy" (or in context, "lunchbox guy"). They also have these guys called subgiewallahs who are basically walking farmers markets...
raghava 15y ago
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/CaseStudy_MumbaiDabbawallas.pdf http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/CaseStudy... (shoddy design of ppt, you have been warned!) Page 10 onwards, their system is described briefly. Another study published by IIM Ahmedabad. http://www.iimahd.ernet.in/publications/data/2005-09-01ravichandran.pdf http://www.iimahd.ernet.in/publications/data/2005-09-01ravic... HBR's case study from last year, for those who want a paid article: http://hbr.org/product/the-dabbawala-system-on-time-delivery-every-time/an/610059-PDF-ENG http://hbr.org/product/the-dabbawala-system-on-time-delivery... Yet another case study: (paid article) http://cases.ivey.uwo.ca/cases/pages/home.aspx?Mode=showproduct&prod=9B04D013 http://cases.ivey.uwo.ca/cases/pages/home.aspx?Mode=showprod... A similar one, comparing NYC. http://etidweb.tamu.edu/classes/idis344/Is%20IT%20a%20necessity%20-%20lunch%20delivery%20system-3p.pdf http://etidweb.tamu.edu/classes/idis344/Is%20IT%20a%20necess... Mumbai dabbawallahs are pretty cool in their methods! (dabba = box, wallah = suffix, that says person)

143 points by ultrasaurus 15y ago

NYT wrote a pretty good article a while ago on these guys: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/29/business/worldbusiness/29lunch.html http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/29/business/worldbusiness/29l...

rokhayakebe 15y ago

I am sure some techies are thinking "I can write software to optimize this system and increase their revenue/profit. I will not charge them for the software, and will make money from the money they save.....". Just ensure your software can guarantee an accuracy rate close to theirs.

eru 15y ago
I bet they are employing mobile phones now.
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
- DufusM 15y ago
  I doubt if the majority of them do, but you are totally right, there is very high cell phone penetration in India. Cell phones with some basic software could help them a lot.
- kamaal 15y ago
  That is already there from a long time. Mobile phone charges have become dirt cheap. Sometimes free calls to some 10 numbers, billed per second(1ps per second). There are pre paid cards. For even 25 rupees(25 cents). You can even avail internet access for a day! From some carriers. I hope you are getting a glimpse of how messy the market is here.

trickjarrett 15y ago

I'm reading "The Starfish and the Spider" right now, though I'm early into the book, this system fascinates me. I find the illiteracy which both videos touched on equally fascinating as the system evolved around the workers' abilities rather than finding workers able to fit the system.

marcamillion 15y ago

It is things like this, why I love capitalism. Not getting into a political debate, but which other economic system known to man, could allow a system to be created that is more efficient than better capitalized rivals (read FedEx, UPS, DHL) and all packages delivered by people that are illiterate. I think it is easy to underestimate the logistical challenges of delivering food to 175,000 people all over a city when you have never tried it. As someone that has worked with a friend try to coordinate lunch orders for just 100 - 200 clients (including buying enough ingredients so there isn't waste, to collecting all orders in time, to delivering lunches on time), let me assure this is no easy feat. The most ironic thing though is that I think that if you were to plot a graph between the number of customers you have and how easy it is, I think you would see that it initially starts a in dip (i.e. delivering and serving lunch for 1 - 10 people is relatively easy, but as you go up to say 500 people complexity blows up and efficiency - on every scale - plummets) and then after you reach some local maxima (when you are able to afford more people and better systems from the revenues) efficiency starts to pick up again and the graph goes up and to the right. God bless the free market - wherever it is!

anonymous246 15y ago
These guys only DELIVER pre-packed lunch boxes. Somebody in the lunch-eaters' HOUSE makes the food and it's picked up from there and delivered to the lunch-eater. This is not a catering service (hence the part of of your comment about procuring food doesn't apply).
- marcamillion 15y ago
  Errr....that makes it even more impressive. Because not only do they have to get lunch to 175,000 people, they also have to pick it up! You are right, I glossed over that fact. I was just using my experience as a vague point of reference for how complicated such a business is - even though on the outside it seems like it might be simple.
  - rdtsc 15y ago
    > Errr....that makes it even more impressive. It is the opposite for me. How bad would it have to get for me to run around in the rain on a bicycle to deliver someone's home-cooked lunch to their office? Pretty bad. I would have to be pretty deep in poverty before I would start considering that. I guess one person looks at this as the triumph of free enterprise, another looks at it as how desperate the situation can get for some. If it is the only job they can get and they have hungry children at home, you bet they will get that 6 sigmas of reliability...

potatolicious 15y ago

Having grown up in Asia before moving to the West, I've always wondered why we accept such shoddy excuses for lunch around here. You've got limp, cold sandwiches, or reheated leftovers in tupperwares. Or you spend a pretty dime on some nice, real food by eating out. Where I grew up, lunchboxes are small, but elaborate - food is neatly compartmentalized like in the article, and just about every place has a steamer to heat it up without the use of microwaves (aka the dessicator).

rdtsc 15y ago
I started bringing lunch to work recently. At home we can cook lunch that is cheaper, healther and tastier than most things I would get around where work. It is only a matter of making a little extra to have for the next day or make larger pot on the weekend. However one thing that is lost is experience of eating together if you are the only one bringing lunch. We just talked about that recently and that it not be under-estimated as far as I am concerned. There is important gossip being discussed, and in general I chatting with coworkers about random (non-work related) stuff. Sometimes I would even eat my lunch then still decide to walk with them and walk back just for fun if the weather is nice.
radicaldreamer 15y ago
What you're seeing is a low standard of living in action. There's enough surplus labor in India to deliver food from homes to offices everyday. You could do this in the US as well- but be prepared to pay however much labor and transportation costs. Average productivity in the US is also much higher than in India (that's why wages are higher), but Americans are no more productive when delivering and preparing this kind/quality of food, so this is unaffordable and you have to settle for lower quality lunches (or be willing to pay more).
- potatolicious 15y ago
  I wasn't talking about food delivery - where I grew up you packed your own lunches, but generally people had much better food for lunch than what you'd see in your average North American office. Employers/schools also took more care in providing the equipment/facilities to heat and cook lunches (far in excess of microwaves, anyhow). It really speaks to a cultural difference - I feel that fast food culture has trained Americans to tolerate crappy food for lunch (or splurging on eating out). Lunch on a work day is not something to be savored, but rather something to be done with. IMHO there's something America can stand to learn here.

jessedhillon 15y ago

Does anyone else think it's ironic that a company called "Design Within Reach" sells tiffins for $85, which even in America could be had for $20. (And in India, perhaps $10-15)

alexg0 15y ago
I been to that store, it's a high end furniture store. Nothing there is 'within reach' for most people, or particularly good value.
sid0 15y ago
> (And in India, perhaps $10-15) More like $4-10, depending on the quality.
spatulon 15y ago
The point of Design Within Reach is not to sell well-designed products at low prices, but to sell well-designed products (mainly furniture) that would otherwise be impossible to buy through normal retail channels. "Within reach" refers to availability, not affordability.

blocke 15y ago

Fascinating article and videos. Thanks for sharing. Chaotic yet organized systems like this fascinate me.

stevoski 15y ago

Definitely fascinating. Don't forget, however, that many of these Mumbai dabbawallahs live a precarious existence. Perhaps the fear of homelessness and hunger encourage the high success rate. This is not a model I'd like to replicate in my own business.

stretchwithme 15y ago
Yeah, the last thing you want to do is give poor people opportunity.

ajju 15y ago

The "high end tiffin set" linked from the article costs $85. You could probably buy it for under $20 at your local Indian grocery store. If you are in a large city it's quite likely within 10 miles of where you live/work.

brianbreslin 15y ago
are all tiffin sets metal? i'm pretty sure i've seen similar concept bento box stacks that are plastic.
- hartror 15y ago
  Yeah I almost clicked buy until I thought "How will I reheat these, microwaves will not like these!"
  - kamaal 15y ago
    So now do you understand why tiffin boxes are made of metal. Not that microwaves can't work with plastics or all sorts of plastics. But because most people in India can't afford to buy a microwave at the first place.
    - intended 15y ago
      We have plastic bowls for use in my office, and a micro. As do most of the other offices - I am in Mumbai, and a micro isn't that hard to afford for the middle class and many firms. That said, there are a lot of other people who eat their food cold. This is India, so for whatever N=true, N'=true
- kamaal 15y ago
  Near the villages and country side most of it metal. Most due to high durability. But in Metro's Plastic is pretty famous and is widely used. Its in our culture to carry tasty food cooked by moms to schools/offices. But it seems like that culture is changing big time. McDonalds et al, have started offering good enough meals for 40 rupees onwards(less than $1 approx). Having said that, 40 rupees very unaffordable for a lunch meal. Even for a software engineer. Dining in all these McDonalds sort of restaurants is considered as for rich people.

srean 15y ago

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N25inoCea24 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N25inoCea24 youtube video of a TED talk by the president of Mumbai Dabbawala Education Centre. Closed captioning would have helped non-indian viewers, this commentary on the video might help http://www.hindu.com/mp/2011/03/14/stories/2011031451160400.htm http://www.hindu.com/mp/2011/03/14/stories/2011031451160400....

blackRust 15y ago

First as mentioned Indian meals take time to cook and there is a strong emphasis on home cooked meals. There is social stigma involved in carrying the tiffin case back. The workforce for the dhabbawallas is cheap and they live on a fairly low income. The way I understand it only a certain caste are dhabbawallas (correct me if I'm wrong). Even though the number of deliveries is huge, the people being delivered earn considerably more than the dhabbawallas, they all have office jobs. Having lived and experienced the Indian mechanism of things I am always impressed when this story resurfaces, but unfortunately knowing India I am very skeptical. They no doubt excel at what they do, but I would take the statistics with a grain of salt. Ask yourself how it is possible to measure such performance? The entire mechanism is so informal and excludes any 'reporting' (in the sense of data about efficiency) and is focused purely on delivery. I know a lot of "certified" companies in India that lack basic factory security, hygiene and protocols: they would fail a "real" certification.

DufusM 15y ago
I do not follow - isn't it all the more amazing that poorly paid, uneducated workers without proper salaries are able to achieve this? I would measure their performance by inserting random 'canary tiffins' over a period and measuring their loss percentage. You could also track some individual carriers and get a similar measure to combine into the previous metric.
Indyan 15y ago
A lot of things emerging from India aren't what they appear to be (eg. The $35 tablet). However, this bit is true. It's slightly hard to believe, but the dabbawallahs have been elaborately studied and covered by lots of esteemed organizations and publications. Btw, the dabbawallahs have a big admirer in Prince Charles.They were even invited to the Charles-Camilla wedding. http://www.mid-day.com/news/2011/apr/270411-dabbawallas-mumbai-prince-william-kate-middleton-royal-wedding.htm http://www.mid-day.com/news/2011/apr/270411-dabbawallas-mumb...
kamaal 15y ago
>>The workforce for the dhabbawallas is cheap and they live on a fairly low income. The way I understand it only a certain caste are dhabbawallas (correct me if I'm wrong). You need to understand the way this system works. In India the smaller cities and towns have virtually no opportunities if you want to financially well off. There fore the metros are flocked. When such a large population of people gather at a city. There are huge opportunities for anything and everything. Tiffin delivery system is one such opportunity. You will see many other things in India. Roadside Coffee, tea and cigarette vendors. In the US you people buy everything in super markets. But here vegetables are sold by people who wander street by street selling vegetables on push carts. Heck there is even a market for people who take care of your slippers when you leave them behind while entering a temple/mosque. Even though what they earn is very meager and may be nothing. But at least they have some means through which they can fill their stomachs. So dabbawallah's may be earning purely on basis of volumes alone.

buckwild 15y ago

I totally remember seeing these dudes when I visited India. Dabbawallah roughly translates to "box guy" (or in context, "lunchbox guy"). They also have these guys called subgiewallahs who are basically walking farmers markets...

raghava 15y ago

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/CaseStudy_MumbaiDabbawallas.pdf http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/CaseStudy... (shoddy design of ppt, you have been warned!) Page 10 onwards, their system is described briefly. Another study published by IIM Ahmedabad. http://www.iimahd.ernet.in/publications/data/2005-09-01ravichandran.pdf http://www.iimahd.ernet.in/publications/data/2005-09-01ravic... HBR's case study from last year, for those who want a paid article: http://hbr.org/product/the-dabbawala-system-on-time-delivery-every-time/an/610059-PDF-ENG http://hbr.org/product/the-dabbawala-system-on-time-delivery... Yet another case study: (paid article) http://cases.ivey.uwo.ca/cases/pages/home.aspx?Mode=showproduct&prod=9B04D013 http://cases.ivey.uwo.ca/cases/pages/home.aspx?Mode=showprod... A similar one, comparing NYC. http://etidweb.tamu.edu/classes/idis344/Is%20IT%20a%20necessity%20-%20lunch%20delivery%20system-3p.pdf http://etidweb.tamu.edu/classes/idis344/Is%20IT%20a%20necess... Mumbai dabbawallahs are pretty cool in their methods! (dabba = box, wallah = suffix, that says person)