Food delivery app tests waters at UNO before serving all of Omaha

This week DliveryPal began delivering food to hungry students and staff at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. It’s part of a three-month-long test run for the food delivery app before the service reaches a wider swath of Omaha. It was first announced in February. Co-founder and CEO Hamza Rehman says he wants to make…

This week DliveryPal began delivering food to hungry students and staff at the University of Nebraska at Omaha.

It’s part of a three-month-long test run for the food delivery app before the service reaches a wider swath of Omaha. It was first announced in February.

Co-founder and CEO Hamza Rehman says he wants to make sure the model works before expanding to more neighborhoods. 

Customers use an iPhone app—an Android app’s on the way—to set their location, pick a nearby restaurant, view the menu, choose a meal after reading a description, make any alterations and place the order. They’ll get a push notification when the driver has picked up their food. 

The first three weeks of the beta period will be free, but will only be available to those who work or live on UNO’s campus near 60th and Dodge.

There are 35 restaurants within a mile and a half to choose from, including options ranging from Subway and Chipotle to local fare like Amsterdam Falafel, Pitch Pizzeria, French Bulldog and the Dundee Dell. 

Starting mid-July, Rehman said he will expand the beta to the Aksarben Village area, too, followed by more neighborhoods this fall. He’s been marketing with door hangers, social media, word of mouth and visiting with people manning the front desks at certain university departments. 

“The’ve all got Jimmy John’s napkins in the office,” Rehman said. “The reality is that if you want to order in food, you’re stuck with the same options and people are getting tired of those same options, but now they have more.”

DliveryPal had a few successful orders so far this week, but want to roll out slowly.

“We don’t want to sacrifice the quality of our service, so we’re starting small and expanding,” Rehman said. “It’s part of seeing what our customers want and improving the product as we go.”

There are similar competitors in the area, but they lack a mobile app or sleek, easy-to-use design, the co-founders say.

Pricing is fairly straight forward: DliveryPal marks up the prices of the food a little bit and charges $1.50 per mile. Other services charge anywhere from $6-12, but require a $15 order minimum. DliveryPal has no order minimum.

Rehman said he wants to make a commitment to have enough drivers so wait times aren’t long. They plan on having multiple drivers near UNO for the pilot and co-founder Thang Nguyen says the jobs would be well-suited for a student with flexible hours.

Rehman says there are a lot of good features built into the app, too. There are fail-safes like a restaurant rejecting an order if they are out of the item. There’s an easy way for the restaurant to get a hold of the driver in case they forgot to include an item.

It was important to Rehman to make the app very simple to use. You can easily re-order a previous order within seconds, he said.

This story is part of the AIM Archive

This story is part of the AIM Institute Archive on Silicon Prairie News. AIM gifted SPN to the Nebraska Journalism Trust in January 2023. Learn more about SPN’s origin »

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