A food delivery company is offering a new incentive to try to gain market share in the highly competitive market: free Bitcoin.
What Happened: Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) rewards company Lolli announced a partnership with food delivery company Grubhub, a unit of Just Eat Takeaway.com. NV – ADR (NASDAQ:GRUB), on Wednesday.
Customers who use Lolli and Grubhub can earn $5 in Bitcoin on their first order and $1 in Bitcoin for each additional order.
The Bitcoin will be tracked on Lolli’s browser extension or app, which must be downloaded before placing orders.
Customers need to reach $15 in Bitcoin rewards before being able to transfer their Bitcoin to their Lolli.com wallet or their own virtual wallet.
“Lolli’s mission is to make Bitcoin more accessible to all and in order to do that we must make Bitcoin a part of everyday life. Food delivery is a ritual for many and Bitcoin rewards make Bitcoin a part of that ritual,” Lolli CEO and co-founder Alex Adelman said.
Lolli offers Bitcoin rewards at more than 1,000 top retailers including Kroger Co (NYSE:KR), Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT), Priceline, Macy’s Inc (NYSE:M), Booking Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:BKNG) and Sephora, owned by LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton (OTC:LVMUY).
More than 400,000 shoppers have signed up for Lolli since launching in 2018.
Lolli signed a deal with Kroger last year to reward shoppers with 1.5% back in Bitcoin on grocery orders for pickup or delivery.
Investors in Lolli include Ashton Kutcher, Ipsy co-founder and beauty entrepreneur Michelle Phan and a unit of Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund. Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian is an investor in the company through his venture capital firm Seven Seven Six.
Related Link: If You Invested $1,000 In Bitcoin On Jan. 1, 2021, Here’s How Much You’d Have Now
Why It’s Important: Grubhub has partnered with more than 300,000 restaurants and offers food delivery in over 4,000 U.S. cities.
The company still ranks well below the leaders in the food delivery space for market share.
DoorDash Inc (NYSE:DASH) led the way with a 57% market share in October, according to research from Second Measure. Uber Eats, a unit of Uber Technologies Inc. (NYSE:UBER) was second with a market share of 24%. Postmates, which is owned by Uber Eats had a 3% market share in October.
Grubhub ranks a distant third place with a market share of 15% in the month of October.
The battle for food delivery market share has led to aggressive pricing on promotions and offering exclusive deals with restaurants to try and gain loyalty amongst users.
Research shows there are fewer customers loyal to one food delivery provider as they shop based on restaurants, price and availability.
Offering Bitcoin as a reward could be one way for GrubHub to appeal more to users who use food delivery and gain share. Offering cryptocurrency-based rewards has been an increasingly popular option.
Recently, Restaurant Brands International Inc (NYSE:QSR) unit Burger King offered cryptocurrency rewards for customers through a partnership with Robinhood Markets Inc (NASDAQ:HOOD).
GRUB Price Action: GRUB shares closed at $12.35 Wednesday, down 0.88% and hitting a new 52-week low. Shares are down over 80% year-to-date.
Photo: Andre Francois McKenzie via Unsplash
