Deliveroo vs Direct Ordering: What UK Restaurants Need to Know
Deliveroo vs direct ordering: the short answer
Deliveroo brings orders. Direct ordering builds a business.
For most UK restaurant and takeaway operators, Deliveroo is useful for new customer acquisition and marketplace visibility. But the economics of relying on it as a primary ordering channel are difficult. Direct ordering through your own website or app costs less per order, gives you full customer data, and builds long-term repeat business.
The most effective operators use both — and have a clear strategy for moving customers from Deliveroo to direct.
What Deliveroo offers restaurants
Deliveroo is a marketplace platform that lists restaurants to millions of UK customers. When a customer places an order, Deliveroo processes it and either handles delivery through its own rider network or passes the order to your kitchen for self-delivery.
Advantages of Deliveroo:
- Immediate visibility to a large existing customer base
- Discovery for restaurants without an established digital presence
- Delivery logistics handled (if using Deliveroo riders)
- No upfront marketing cost to get started
Disadvantages of Deliveroo:
- Commission on each order (the exact rate varies by contract and package; operators should verify current rates directly with Deliveroo)
- No access to customer data — you cannot contact customers who order through Deliveroo
- Your brand competes on a marketplace alongside every other restaurant in your area
- You cannot run loyalty programmes for Deliveroo customers
- Limited control over the customer experience and brand presentation
What direct ordering offers restaurants
Direct ordering means customers order through your own website or branded app. You pay a platform fee to the technology provider but no per-order commission.
Advantages of direct ordering:
- No commission on each order — the full order value contributes to your margin
- You own the customer data: name, email, order history
- You can run email, SMS, and push notification campaigns to your customer base
- Loyalty programmes work — customers earn points, return more often, spend more
- Full control over your brand experience, menu presentation, and promotions
- No competing restaurants on the same screen
Disadvantages of direct ordering:
- Requires investment in your own digital presence
- Discovery relies on your own marketing, not platform traffic
- Requires customers to download your app or visit your website directly
The margin difference: why commission matters so much
For a restaurant with thin margins, per-order commission can make delivered orders unprofitable before any other costs are considered.
Consider a simplified illustration:
| Metric | Direct order | Marketplace order |
|---|---|---|
| Order value | £25 | £25 |
| Commission | Platform fee only | Significant % per order |
| Net revenue to restaurant | Higher | Lower |
| Customer data captured | Yes | No |
Over thousands of orders per month, the difference in net revenue compounds significantly. Many operators find that heavy marketplace reliance generates revenue while delivering no meaningful profit. This is not a criticism of Deliveroo as a product — it reflects the economics of marketplace platforms, which exist to monetise the relationship with the customer.
The customer data problem
When a customer orders through Deliveroo, Deliveroo owns that relationship. You receive an order but not a named, contactable customer.
With direct ordering, every order builds your database. A customer who orders five times through your website is a contact you can email with a loyalty reward, a new menu launch, or a referral offer. The same customer ordering five times through Deliveroo remains anonymous to you.
At scale, this difference in customer data asset is substantial. A restaurant group with tens of thousands of direct customers and an active email programme operates a fundamentally different business from one processing the same revenue through a marketplace.
Using both: a sensible approach
Most UK operators use Deliveroo alongside a direct channel. The question is how to structure that relationship.
A common approach:
- Use Deliveroo for discovery and new customer acquisition
- Include in every order a reason for the customer to order direct next time — a loyalty offer, a QR code, a discount on the first direct order
- Build the direct channel so that repeat customers naturally migrate to it
- Track the percentage of orders that are direct vs marketplace over time and set a target
The goal is to use Deliveroo to fill the top of the funnel, then convert those customers to a direct relationship where the margin and data economics work in your favour.
How Flipdish helps restaurants build a direct channel
Flipdish provides the technology for building a high-performing first-party ordering channel. This includes a branded restaurant website with built-in online ordering, a branded mobile app, and a loyalty programme that gives customers a reason to order direct.
The Flipdish AI marketing tools automate the customer retention work — win-back campaigns for lapsed customers, re-engagement sequences, and targeted promotions — so the direct channel grows without requiring significant manual marketing effort from the operator.
For restaurant operators evaluating whether to invest in their own direct ordering channel, Flipdish is designed to make that investment as low-friction as possible while providing a meaningfully better margin per order than marketplace alternatives.