7 ms·
Show HN: People Food - $7 Office Lunches for Hungry Startups
- karangoeluw 13y agoGood idea. But I think pricing needs an update. Usually eating out is $5 a meal.
- jmhamel 13y agoThanks! Just curious, but where can I get a $5 meal in SF? (Not trying to sound rude, I just can't find anywhere that cheap :) Also, I would say that most popular catering option in SF is ZeroCater, and their website says that meals start at $12-14/person.
- munaf 13y agoNot many places. You can get a good Bahn Mi in the inner sunset for < $5. Also, Mehfil in SOMA has a $5 lunch special, but it's not a balanced meal.
- dshanahan 13y agojust found a banh mi stand outside the SF Fed today ~$4 per sandwich. Was surprised, to say the least:)
- d3gamer 13y agoCafe Algiers @ Beale and Mission (financial district) $5 sandwiches
- arsenerei 13y agoIn what region? Downtown prices in my experience are minimum $7.
- Datsundere 13y agoDoes meal usually include drinks as well?
- jmhamel 13y agoWe're not doing drinks right now, but it's on the "we might add this soon" list. What kind of drinks would you want with your food?
- dsr_ 13y agoA strongly brewed iced tea. Apple cider and seltzer. Fresh lemonade. Unusual sodas. Don't bother with run-of-the-mill soft drinks or hot coffee, or plain water, or indeed anything that a startup would ordinarily stock in a mini-fridge. They aren't interesting enough.
- arsenerei 13y agoNo.
- lifeformed 13y ago$5 if you're eating fast-food in the midwest suburbs. Even then, a "normal" combo meal is closer to $6 or $7.
- bluedino 13y agoDollar Menu. Or dollar-ish menu. Chicken nuggets and a small chili @ Wendy's for example.
- lifeformed 13y agoYeah, but that's hardly a meal worth catering...
- tinbad 13y agoI assume no drinks included as it's not mentioned anywhere and at $7 it seems very fair/competitive. If you get a sandwich or buffet in SF it's usually around $7-10 as well. Delivery can also be a nice bonus - especially since going out to get lunch at peak times can be hectic in the city. I hope the food is not too heavy though as I remember we used to have a Chevys right by our office in SOMA and whenever we went there with the team for lunch we usually wouldn't be back until 2 hours later and wanting to take a nap at the office :) I'm also curious what the minimum order amount is.
- jmhamel 13y agoCorrect, no drinks right now. Might offer as an add-on in the future. We're really striving for "feel good" meals that fill you up, but don't slow down your brain for the rest of the day. Minimum order is only 2 meals, but we charge a bit more ($8.50) if you only have a few people.
- ztratar 13y agoMost catering companies charge at least $12 per head. This is a deal. $5 would be near impossible to sustain.
- Matt_Mickiewicz 13y agoI've had quotes for $20-$30 (!) per person for lunch in SF...
- adhsu01 13y agoMaybe in Seattle. In general, double your prices for the Bay Area. :) I'd be really happy if I could consistently find a $5 meal in SF.
- evandena 13y ago8 new Outlook windows on the other monitor later, I realize it's a mailto link. And show me some pictures of the food!
- jmhamel 13y agoI totally feel you about the mailto link - It was just a quick way to get everything up and running. Will definitely change soon :) P.s. Know any good food photographers?!
- pirateking 13y agoI have a reference - contact info in profile.
- jmhamel 13y agoAwesome, thanks!!
- justhw 13y agoTry this, someone showhn'd a while ago. http://squaresend.com http://squaresend.com
- jmhamel 13y agoNice, I like it!
- ztratar 13y agoTotally agree here. Pictures of food would help a ton. Also think you could do a lot with marketing here... differentiate yourself through fresh ingredients or better supplies. Make that apparent if you have any leg up. Convince them you're better with some unique flair and customer testimonials.
- vishaldpatel 13y agoQuestions: Why did you pick $7? Why not $10 or $15? What diet will the first meal plans be for? Will it be all organic? Is it freshly prepared each day from raw ingredients?
- jmhamel 13y agoI think it's much more affordable for a seed stage startup. Also, ZeroCater is more in the $10-15 price range and they're feeding more series A and above companies.
- jff 13y ago$7 will buy you a couple tacos and a bottle of Coke at the taco truck. $7 is a pretty good price for lunch. Now, given that it's for startups in San Francisco, the demand for local-sourced organic quinoa meat substitute may make $7 harder to do.
- jmhamel 13y ago"local-sourced organic quinoa meat substitue" hahahaha so true
- jmtame 13y agoWhat a great idea. When will you support Palo Alto/peninsula area cities?
- jmhamel 13y agoWhy thank you! Once we get settled in SF, the rest of the Bay Area is next (~6 months) :D
- shivaas 13y agoany plans to expand to Seattle soon? Would love to give this a try for our team
- jmhamel 13y agoWe're still getting settled in SF, but I'll add Seattle to the list :)
- aabalkan 13y agoThis sounds promising. I upvoted just because I want SF folks to afford cheap and healthy lunch. I hope it all goes well and you can expand to Seattle area.
- jmhamel 13y agoThanks so much for the support! I also hope all goes well and we can expand to the Seattle area soon :)
- dafzal 13y agoFYI, it seems like the email you have listed (support@pplfood.com) is bouncing.
- jmhamel 13y agoHmm just tested it and it seems to be working. Also, my inbox is overflowing haha. Try again and let me know if it works!
- dpiers 13y agoA few questions: - Do you have a minimum/maximum order size? - What sort of commitment do you require (the FAQ mentions a commitment but doesn't give details)? - Can you accommodate my low carb/dairy-free/gluten-free/MOKO* lifestyle? - Are there any feedback mechanisms so I can let you know what I thought about the food? - Is there any choice in what I get, or is it all chosen for me? - Do you guarantee my food will arrive when I want it and not two hours late? *MOKO: will only eat 'meat of known origin'
- jmhamel 13y agoMinimum order size: 2. We didn't really set a maximum, but so far, nobody has asked for more than we can handle. All of our current customers have a repeating weekly order. If they want to change it, they have to tell us by Friday the week before. That's really all a 'commitment' means. Right now, only 1 meat meal and 1 vegan meal a day. We're thinking about adding a GF option. I was supposed to add a feedback button today, but now my email inbox is overflowing :) All chosen for you. Current customers love the 'surprise factor' and haven't had any complaints about food choices yet. Yes. We did have our delivery schedule run 15 mins behind one day and apologized with a 5% discount for our customers. Hope that answers everything :)
- jroll 13y agoIf you don't support weird dietary restrictions like dpiers listed, you will miss out on a lot of offices. Source: I currently work for ZeroCater. dpiers used to work at ZeroCater, and these are questions you're going to get hit with.
- justin66 13y ago> Right now, only 1 meat meal and 1 vegan meal a day. We're thinking about adding a GF option. One emphatic suggestion: make sure your vegetarian/vegan meals have as many calories as the meat meals. This is something that so many caterers get wrong. Low-carb and MOKO strike me as not something you should take into consideration but options to avoid dairy and gluten make sense for when you expand your menu, as those can be serious allergies for some people. I would add nut allergies to the list, as they're quite common.
- urberdurr 13y agoJesus, Iowa is cheap I think I averaged $2 a meal last month. Sandwiches and cereal FTW.
- staunch 13y ago1. Make it $10 or $11. It's the most a lazy and cheap person will pay and it's a lot more than $7. You're still way cheaper than most other options. Use most of the money on delivering great food. 2. Cleanliness! Make sure you put in serious effort to ensuring the things you're delivering were prepared properly and cleanly. That they arrive nicely (tape soup lids well!). One round of office food poisoning... 3. Target individuals and teams. Get groups of people in companies to start "Lunch Pooling" (thelunchpool.com available :D). Make a minimum subscriber count of 3 or even more, so it's worth your while and people are forced to spread the word. Or even use the PayPal/Dropbox technique, people inviting others could get a free lunch. If enough employees do it on their own some companies will decide to just do it for the whole company. The Apple approach to "enterprise" sales. 4. Come to Santa Monica, CA.
- jmhamel 13y ago1. We've though about it, but we really want to support the scrappy little seed-stage startups who can't afford $11 lunches, but want to eat lunch as a team. 2. No problems with that so far, but thanks for the tip! 3. That's a good idea! We've been suggesting to really small startups (<5 people) that they order lunch along with other companies in their building. 4. You got it!
- optimusclimb 13y agoShouldn't the scrappy seed stage startup be hitting up Safeway and buying bread and cold cuts, pb&j, or...ramen, if it wants to be "scrappy"?
- jmhamel 13y agoThat's definitely the traditional idea. Here are two reasons that I think $7 is worth their money: 1. Foods like pb&j and ramen aren't exactly going to keep your brain in tip-top condition all day. Unbalanced meals can make you feel very tired. 2. Many of these scrappy startups can't make the time to even order groceries online. (source: I lived in a hacker house for a year)
- rodly 13y agoHow can I be sure you source from local markets? This doesn't scale easily either. How do you plan to combat carelessness when demand goes up and you all of sudden need to push out 1000 or 10,000 meals at lunch time?
- jmhamel 13y agoI guess you can never be entirely sure. (Do you have any ideas about how we can prove this to people?) Sometimes, we like to slip in notes about where the food came from, but we don't have any rigid guidelines set in place right now.
- rodly 13y agoPerhaps you could have a nice looking "Our Food Sources" page that details the markets, farmers, etc? I might be the minority on this, but when I see food locally sourced I'm more likely to buy it than generic food brand X. Locally sourced to me = fresher, healthier, and better for my local economy obviously
- jmhamel 13y agoGreat idea, thanks!
- GrinningFool 13y agoa) you'll just have to trust them, the same as you trust any merchant to deliver what is promised. b) turn down clients until they can accommodate.
- jmhamel 13y agoWow, this was much better than my answer! Thanks :)
- GrinningFool 13y agoHeh, np. I"m not in the area so I won't be able to sign up, but this seems like one of those "holy crap, why didn't someone think of this before" kind of ideas. Good luck with it :)
- budwin 13y agoWhat a wonderful idea. Just FYI, I went to share this on facebook, and the thumbnail was white on white. You might want to put a few metadata tags in there.
- jmhamel 13y agoAhh thanks for noticing that! Just added it to the infinite to-do list :)
- tejay 13y agoIf I lived in SF I'd totally jump on this. I was so productive in college because I lived right next to a gym and my dining hall had unlimited eating from 7am until 8p, every day.
- physcab 13y agoI'm all for more lunch options. Can you please offer a healthy snack solution as well? I'd pay out of pocket for this. 4pm is my hunger-witching time.
- jmhamel 13y agoOoh good idea. How much would you pay for a 4pm snack?
- physcab 13y agoI got a Naturebox ($20/month) for my mom and she loves it. I'm considering doing the same this year for her and myself and I think its the right price point. If my company stocked Naturebox treats, they would be a huge hit. Most tech companies seem to be using the same service for their snacks. Whenever I visit another office I always see the same assortment of Popchips, Doritos, Pirates Booty as well as Vitamin Water, Crystal Geyser mineral water, Odwalla, and soft drinks.
- nzp 13y agoYou made a well designed front page. The colours are nicely fitting and the logo is great it associated with some kind of food immediately (made me think of spring rolls or something like that)! Just wanted to say that after a day of repeatedly stumbling upon extremely annoying hip, identical, scroll-untill-you-die sites, yours made me smile a little. And now I'm hungry.
- jmhamel 13y agoThank you so much for the lovely compliment :)
- memset 13y agoI love that you folks - in contrast to so many other catering companies - are transparent with your pricing! Come to NYC? (question: what are our options in NYC? Besides seamless, which basically means we eat from the same 3 places every week?)
- jmhamel 13y agoThanks! Hopefully we'll come to NYC sometime in the future :)
- rikacomet 13y ago-Whats the approx nutritional value for all your combos, crude figures on the lower side of estimate would be a good thing to know.
- jmhamel 13y agoWe aim for 600-800 calories per serving, but we don't make any promises about the exact nutritional value
- diziet 13y agoJust ordered and tried the food. It was very good. https://www.dropbox.com/s/z5232fgpj0xs77g/DSC_0461.JPG https://www.dropbox.com/s/z5232fgpj0xs77g/DSC_0461.JPG https://www.dropbox.com/s/bczdlrf4gp1szp7/DSC_0452.JPG https://www.dropbox.com/s/bczdlrf4gp1szp7/DSC_0452.JPG