It's 24th July today and we have returned back to Heightened Alert Phase 2 on 21st July 2021, just slightly more than a week after coming out of Heightened Alert Phase 3 on 12th July. Although the strategy is to treat the Covid-19 situation as endemic moving forward, less than ideal vaccination rates among the population (at 50 plus %) has cause us to move back to the start-stop situation again with the KTV and Fishery Port outbreak.
But what really matters is hawker centres and F&B establishments are once again forced to fall back on takeaways & delivery options. A special workgroup has been formed to better helped hawkers tap on delivery platforms, but how effective will it be to drive this when fundamental issues highlighted by hawkers & F&B establishments are not resolved. Let's take a look and some of these well documented issue to cut out some work for the special workgroup:
Many hawkers and F&B establishments are already complaining about this but no one seems to listen. Reason seems to be that platforms are the only way to go and everyone should just go to them if you don't want to go bust.
But the key issue is, many of the food establishments may bust as they may make losses from actually selling their products after paying commissions to the platform, or risk losing customers if the cost is passed on to the customers whom also need to pay for delivery.
2. Hawkers & Restaurant Business Model is not designed for Delivery - Can't Cover RENTAL
Unlike restaurants whom typically has a large operating space and more manpower, hawkers are typically operating by themselves alone or have 1 to 3 more helpers. Only a small portion of hawkers have more than 5 manpower within their stall. Space is usually pretty limited. A hawker usually operates to serve those who dine-in or are physically there to take away the food.
To take online delivery, the hawker will typically need another cook to handle the online orders, else most hawkers would have problems coping with handling dine-in, physical takeaway and online delivery orders. We are already seeing food establishments taking online delivery prioritising such orders and neglecting those who are physically there to order. Not sure if this led to cases where there was a Covid-19 outbreak at hawker centres due to patrons waiting more than 30 minutes physically there for their orders.
For restaurants, delivery is also not an option as they rely on waiter recommendations and upselling to increase per table order value. Food quality is also usually compromised as not all food taste the same when you taste there and when you take back home to eat. It's true that restaurants probably need to innovate to create delivery friendly menu but in doing so, they probably do not require their current restaurant setup to do such delivery business.
3. Digitisation is platform centric and not stake-holder centric
In many articles, there have been numerous feedback that the platform typically favors a particular segment of their stakeholders - which basically forms the unique selling point of individual platforms. As a commercial platform, there is definitely nothing wrong. However, from a principle perspective, there is certain flaw which we will address later.
One of the major key challenge in onboarding hawkers especially is their familiarity with the language used on the platform. Again, it is suited more for certain segment of stakeholders but not for the hawker group, which are typically older folks whom are more proficient in their native language like Mandarin, Malay, Indian etc. This typically becomes a "chicken or egg" issue. The usual way to resolve this is to treat it as an "egg". Send the hawkers for course to pick up English.
However, why can't we treat the issue as a "chicken" instead. The hawker is already well proficient in their native language and their targeted audience should be generally fine as well. So, why can't we put their native language onto the platform instead? The platform has always said they are here to solve problems and communications have always been a big issue. Why do they try to escape instead of solving it?
To tackle the above problems, I have pondered and wondered whether we can address some aspects as follows:
- Replace Sharing Economy with Co-Operatives
At this time and age, the term 'sharing economy' is no longer widely popular or heard out loud these days. Most of these entities are mainly smart and highly educated (MBAs) individuals/teams earning the trust of wealthy backers, entrusting them with large monetary war chest to disrupt the market. If we roll back 10 years, what they did is indeed a game changer. But 10 years forward, as technology matures, they are becoming "commoditise" and commoditising everything & everyone associated with them.
Not that this isn't good. But it basically means everyone associated with them will be eventually paid poorly. The high commission charged is already well documented. And when we really look into the commission structure, this is also highly understandable for a commercial company. But if the platform will be to operate as a co-operative, what will be the possibilities? Interested to know? If enough people show interest and comment, I will write a follow-up article or do a club house sharing to discuss further.
For the co-operative platform to really work well, we will need to really bring out the Singapore "Kampong Spirit". We must have the mind share that business setup within its current precinct is to serve its local community, whether residing or working there. It is costly to shift location.
Distant water will not quench a fire nearby
For the delivery team to be efficient and make a comfortable income, customers need to support their local community hawker & F&B establishments. A route based delivery system needs to be in place so they can maximise their effort and make a reasonable living. Glad our Government has come up with something but it's been put on open source for anyone interested to develop further. Can check it out here.
2. Fair Burden Sharing on Rental Obligation
On hindsight, the Governments support on JSS and other subsidies are targeted at saving jobs. However, if the businesses requiring customers to patronise in-store to operate are not able to do so effective due to safe distancing measures, paying the same rental for less effective space doesn't make sense. In such instances, guidelines for usable space based on safe distancing measures are published publicly.
If that's the case, why can't landlords just shoulder the "ineffective" rental space cost as that will be deemed fair since it's mandated by Government. In the first place, the traffic of the overall property would be reduced to meet the overall safe distancing measures. If traffic is reduced artificially, how can they expect to charge the same rates for rental? However, in doing so, the landlords who take loans to service their properties may face issues in meeting their loan obligations. Banks may also need to participate in this process to ensure every involved party play their part. Not including all stakeholders merely shows how shallow the problem is perceived to be and reduce the effectiveness of any measure curated.
3. Hawker Centric Digitalisation Needed
As observed since we roll back to Heightened Alert Phase 2 since 21st July, many hawkers have decided to close shop during this period as they anticipate business to be worse than Heightened Alert Phase 3. We can see a lot of Facebook Groups touting support for many eateries but information is appearing here and there. Without a Co-operative Kampung Spirit app, it's going to be hard to coordinate such efforts. Even if there is such an app, it should basically have some of the following essential features:
- Shop Opening Hours or Close for the Day - No wasted trip if you know in advance they are not opened.
- Online Delivery Ordering Period - For hawkers whom have lean manpower, they should state the period they are able to take online orders so they can also focus on dine-in customers outside of such periods. Customers need to be mindful why they need to place their orders earlier and have their meals earlier to support their community eateries.
- Maximum number of Online Order - Unless the hawker is a Cloud Kitchen, it would not make sense to focus on such orders and neglect your dine in audience. All current platforms should at least share the postal codes of the hawker's customers. As current location may not be ideal, the data will better allow the hawker's to know where their customers are residing and relocate nearer to their customers or consider having a 2nd branch near to them.
- Tier based Advertising - For customers whom have ordered from hawkers/restaurants before, hawkers should be able to "reach out" these existing customers based on the volume of customers they have attained in form of standard platform fee. Only when they wish to reach out to audience whom are not their customers, then they should pay an advertising fee, on top of the standard platform fee.
- Native Language App User Interface - Language is still very much a key barrier in communication. It is paramount that the app is language friendly to hawkers, delivery team and customers ordering food. Each of these stakeholders should interact with the app in a language they are familiar with, nothing less. In doing so, you are helping hawkers digitalise with empathy.
In summary, to help our hawkers and restaurants, we have to stare the issues in the face and address them. In certain cases, it is indeed possible to look from another perspective and innovate to find alternative solutions. But when we deal with fundamental immovable issues like fixed location, rental obligations and rental issues, running away from them will not solve anything and any solution cooked up will be half-baked. This endemic situation serves as a really good time to re-ignite the Singapore Kampung Spirit.
I would also like to re-emphasis that language is still a very big issue today, which continues to cause a lot of inequality globally. Not everyone can pick up a language easily, especially when we are older and have different life priorities. Singapore, as a multi-racial nation, is best suited to tackle this issue and showcase how we deal with it equally. Platforms whom can conquer the language issue in Singapore will likely have a head start in this ASEAN-politan region. So, STAND AND FIGHT. Bring a piece of Singapore to the region and beyond.
*Disclaimer: the article reflects my personal thoughts after reading numerous articles on this subject matter and draw insights from my personal observations.
