Kangaroo Food Delivery App Jumps Into Fredericton
FREDERICTON— A new food delivery app has jumped into Fredericton, offering lower delivery prices and exclusive local restaurant options.
Kangaroo Delivery aims to take the technology the bigger market delivery apps use and design them for independent restaurants in university towns.
Maritime entrepreneur and founder, Logan MacGillivray, said he launched the app to create affordable delivery for students in smaller areas. MacGillivray was inspired while living in Wolfville during his third year at Acadia, where he noticed only bigger cities such as Halifax are graced with food delivery services.
“Unlike the big services, which are designed around the needs of big cities, Kangaroo was built from the ground up to serve smaller towns and cities,” said MacGillivray.
The app features restaurants that are not available through SkipTheDishes or DoorDash, two competing food delivery services in Fredericton. These restaurants include The Abbey Café and Gallery, The Cellar, and MOCO Downtown.
MacGillivray has been successful in his partnerships with local restaurants due to the lower fee he charges compared to SKIP or DoorDash.
“It all comes back to our unique operating algorithm designed for smaller markets. It allows us to operate much more efficiently,” said MacGillivray. “When you operate efficiently, you don’t need to charge everyone more to make money.”
MacGillivray modelled the business to ensure couriers are treated fairly. He said this way restaurants and regular customers become familiar with the couriers.
“We do this by ensuring they keep all their tips and, most importantly, stay busy and make money. We want our couriers to stay with us,” said MacGillivray.
The Abbey Café and Gallery values Kangaroo’s treatment of their couriers. Owner Tabitha Smith said it is one of the reasons she exclusively uses Kangaroo.
“It’s important to me that employees are treated fairly and everyone’s being paid their worth,” said Smith.
Though the app initially sought out students, MacGillivray has discovered there is a growing interest across all demographics for delivery at a low price. With Covid-19, the appetite for Kangaroo’s delivery service only grew.
“It feels good to be able to help restaurants connect with customers and weather this huge challenge,” said MacGillivray.
MacGillivray said he loves being able to help local businesses, and he knows many of his customers appreciate Kangaroo being part of the local community. He said he knows it is important to customers that they support local businesses, and this drives customers to use Kangaroo over other delivery apps.
MacGillivray said Kangaroo is excited to expand its service to other cities in the near term.