Zesty (YC W14) Launches Healthy Catering Service

Dobbs 12 years ago |

We are playing around with Zesty (from ZeroCater) at the moment. Restaurants that were bottom of the barrel with ZeroCater turned out to not be bad at all when handled by Zesty. I'm not sure if this has to do with how they keep the food warm or how they order it.

Either way Zesty > ZeroCater imho.

trevoragilbert 12 years ago |

This seems to me like one of those companies that exists in San Francisco and not in the real world. There are plenty of catering services that do this type of thing locally, and it's not really clear why a company would go through the friction of changing.

Anyone seeing this be $1b+ exit? Me either.

baddox 12 years ago | |

The idea that all companies need to have a $1b+ exit seems like an idea that exists in San Francisco and not in the real world.

midas007 12 years ago | | |

Yeah, it depends. Some people want to go for max $, and that's cool (WDWTMCW). Some go for max cool, and don't care to much about cash. Some folks even will go for cool even if it's a white elephant and not survivable. I think it's fine to aim for valuations anywhere in the $20M-$750MM USD range. Heck, some things are almost FNACs and so are $5-50MM, so that's cool to. Priorities (pre VC) are founder's personal business choices, so to each their own.

trevoragilbert 12 years ago | | |

More so that it exists in the world of Venture Capital.

the_watcher 12 years ago | |

Housekeepers exist in every city (agency and private). Homejoy is doing fine, because they can do it cheaper and more efficiently. Something existing doesn't mean it can't be improved.

trevoragilbert 12 years ago | | |

Yes, but most homeowners/renters don't have a contract with a housekeeper in the way that companies do with catering companies.

I'm not arguing that the system can't be improved, just that this seems to be saying "existing product, but software!" as if that's going to improve lives suddenly.

the_watcher 12 years ago | | |

The company I work for doesn't have a contract with a catering company, but we have catered lunches. I think you overestimate the number of long term contracts companies enter into with catering companies. While catering companies may have a large number of those contracts, the percent of companies that can afford/want to pay for them is not large. Reducing the cost and quality absolutely represents a quality of life increase (I don't live in California, and I would love to use them).

elwell 12 years ago | |

> Me either.

neither*

(btw, I have an asterisk after the word "neither", but it doesn't show because of formatting. anyway to make those show (I tried adding a space after it))

Edit: when I submitted with text after the space after the asterisk it worked. But how would I do it if the asterisk was the last character in my post?

sharpshoot 12 years ago | |

The key is software leverage. Catering company on the outside, yet scale is achieved with a small headcount and software for logistics, meal selection, ordering as well as being a true marketplace etc.

trevoragilbert 12 years ago | | |

That's a possibility (though not guaranteed).

It still doesn't address the lack of compelling reason for an existing company to switch to this as a catering service.

If you're in a big company, you probably have a) a contract with a major catering service and b) lock-in by default of no unsatisfied need.

Am I missing something here?

blbraverman 12 years ago |

@URX (YC S13) Switched to Zesty ~1 month ago and have honestly been blown away by the service. I've been on the receiving end of catered meals at several companies - none have offered the food quality or customer service of Zesty. In the rare instance that a meal isn't perfect (almost always that our ravenous team wanted larger portions), David and the team have gone above and beyond to make sure we were happy.

The best part - they've NEVER brought us anything we weren't excited to eat. Clearly Zesty takes restaurant screening and meal planning very seriously.

snowmaker 12 years ago |

We use Zesty at Scribd and have been very happy with them. We've tried basically all the corporate catering services, ran a direct head-to-head with detailed employee surveys and all, and Zesty won hands down.

If you have a startup in San Francisco and are looking for catering / food for your employees, you should definitely use Zesty.

jkresner 12 years ago |

I've been eating Zesty's breakfasts for several weeks now and the overall service quality is dramatically better than any other catering I've seen.

jaksmit 12 years ago | |

what sort of breakfasts did they have?

judegomila 12 years ago |

Using Zesty at Heyzap and loving it. They seemed to have solved some of the key problems with corporate lunch delivery. 1. Getting the food in hot. 2. Reliable delivery. 3. Fair sized portions. 4. Healthy options. 5. Employee customization / feedback.

borisms 12 years ago |

Zesty is amazing, particularly if you care about eating healthy. Very happy customer.

mrmch 12 years ago |

Awesome, taking the bacon from Zerocater already

ebrescia 12 years ago |

We (Bitnami) have been using Zesty for a couple of weeks and are really happy so far. The food has always arrived on time, they've been great at helping us curate the list of restaurants they rotate through for us and the food is healthy and plentiful.

midas007 12 years ago |

Just curious about scaling distribution: do they deliver themselves, use waiter.com / MyEatClub or similar?

I would use MyEatClub, but I'm ovo-latco-pesci-vegetarian, and don't like restaurant food loaded with cream and salt.

erichurkman 12 years ago |

Is it just SF, or does it include Southbay area too? (MV)

langer 12 years ago | |

Hi Eric, we are currently serving San Francisco but we're planning to roll out to the South Bay soon. If you email me at david at zesty dot com, I can put you on our list of pilot companies down there.

irra_k 12 years ago |

Love Zesty! Makes a huge difference actually going in the kitchen and 'healthy-fying' the process. Less guilt, more yum, just perfect.

chrysb 12 years ago |

Big fan of Zesty for personal meals. Can't wait to use their catering service when we move into our new offices.

abstractbill 12 years ago |

Congrats guys, we are loving Zesty :)

apoorvamehta 12 years ago |

Instacart switched to Zesty for dinner and super happy so far. The restaurant choices are great.

sunnydhillon25 12 years ago |

Awesome! Congrats Langer and Chris!