When we started our business Tasty African Food nearly two decades ago, the world of food delivery looked very different. Our focus was entirely on serving authentic, home-style African meals to our local communities.
Fast forward to today, and the food landscape is dominated by third-party platforms like Uber Eats and Deliveroo. These platforms promised visibility and convenience – but for us, the reality was a little different.
Like many food businesses, we initially embraced these apps as a way to reach more customers. We joined with the hope that exposure would help us grow faster and bring African cuisine to a wider audience. And to be fair, they did deliver traffic.
But over time, we began to see cracks in the model, and those cracks prompted a difficult but necessary question: why are we letting someone else own the customer experience?
The platform problem
The truth is, while Uber Eats and similar services give you reach, they take more than they give back. Their commission fees are high – often 30% or more – and that’s just the start. You lose control over your pricing, your branding, and most importantly, your relationship with your customers. For a business like ours, built on loyalty and trust, that’s not sustainable.
We’d hear feedback from customers that their order had arrived late. Or that they couldn’t find our full menu on the app. Or that they tried to reorder and couldn’t because the app had marked us as “closed” due to an error.
And while the customer blamed us, we had no control over the logistics or presentation. Worse still, we had no way to fix it or even reach out to make it right.
The customer isn’t theirs, it’s ours
One of the most frustrating things about third-party delivery platforms is how little customer insights they share. We had no idea who our repeat customers were, what dishes they loved, or how often they ordered. The platform owned that data, and they weren’t sharing it.
In a digital age, that’s a huge loss. We knew we were building something bigger than a takeaway service. We were building a brand, a community, a movement around West African food. But it’s hard to build a community when you don’t even know your audience.
That’s when we made the decision to invest in our own app.
We built an app
Was it easy? Not at all. We’re a family-run food business, not a tech startup. But we knew we couldn’t rely on third-party platforms to grow in a meaningful, sustainable way.
We started by mapping out what we wanted the customer experience to look like. We didn’t want to replicate Uber Eats, we wanted something better. An experience where customers could explore our story, browse our full menu, and order directly from us with confidence.
We partnered with a small tech team that understood our vision and helped us bring it to life. Within months, we had a branded, fully functional ordering app. It wasn’t perfect on day one, but it was ours. And that made all the difference.
Since launching the app, the feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. Our regulars love the simplicity and speed. And they feel a stronger connection to our brand. We’re able to reward loyalty, run targeted offers, and get real-time insights into what’s working.
Most importantly, it has given us the freedom to innovate. We’ve introduced click-and-collect, pre-ordering, and even loyalty rewards – all on our own terms.
Own your growth
If you’re a food business just starting out, third-party apps can feel like the only option. And to be fair, they can help in the early days. But don’t fall into the trap of relying on them forever. They’re not designed to help you grow, they’re designed to keep you dependent.
Building your own tech might feel daunting, but it’s one of the best decisions we’ve ever made. It’s not just about cutting costs, it’s about owning your customer relationships, your brand, and your future.
At Tasty African Food, we’ve always believed in doing things with heart. Launching our own app wasn’t just a business move, it was a way of staying true to who we are, and making sure every plate we serve is part of a bigger story. And this time, we’re the ones telling it.
Tasty African Food is a leading West African restaurant chain in the UK. With his wife Abi, Michael grew the business from a single Woolwich site into 27 restaurants, a catering arm, ready meals in Sainsbury’s, and a food-ordering app. Michael has built a company with over 250 staff and £7m in revenue, while mentoring the next generation of entrepreneurs. At 58, he is pursuing an ambitious plan to expand to 100 restaurants nationwide within five years, bringing authentic West African cuisine to a wider audience.
