Drops as a model for selling food
Besame’s menu after a sold-out drop
Hopefully you’ve gotten a good sense of what we do and why we do it.
Now, let’s look at how this all plays out. This post will walk through the mechanics of how food is sold on Hotplate.
Selling food through drops
On Hotplate, customers pre-order through drops.
Why pre-orders and why drops? And, what do those terms even mean?!
The short of it: drops are the most profitable and operationally sustainable way to run a food business. It’s also a model that is geared to help you grow.
But first, what is a drop?
If you’re sitting there asking what do they even mean by drops? you’re not alone.
A drop is when a limited supply of product becomes available for purchase all at once. Concert tickets, limited edition merch, sneakers, and celebrity makeup products are commonly sold this way.
When marketed properly, drops are highly anticipated, fiercely competitive, and sell out instantly. Think Taylor Swift Era’s tour tickets.
But don’t worry, you don’t need a multi-million dollar marketing budget to become a successful food dropper. This is actually the easiest and most cost-effective way to start and run a food business.
Drops imply that your product isn’t always available for purchase. The only available inventory or time to purchase is during the drop. Scarcity and timing are key ingredients.
Lastly, a drop means that your customers are pre-ordering - typically days (or more) ahead of when they pickup.
Watch Rishi, one of our founders, explain it real quick:
Who should sell food via drops?
Food drops are for everyone.
After powering $50M+ in sales across all 50 states, we can confidently say we’ve seen it all: stay at home moms, James Beard pastry chefs, UI designers, HVAC installers, firefighters, Fortune 500 executives, recent college grads, retirees. They’ve all started and grown businesses on Hotplate. A Benedictine monk from one of the country’s oldest monasteries drops a weekly bake sale on Hotplate, and sells out every time.
How drops benefit the chef?
Cash up front: customers pay when they place their order. No need to chase the money down.
No ingredient waste: you know exactly how much to make, so you can buy your ingredients accordingly and nothing more.
Control inventory: no more taking orders via DMs, manually tracking in Google Sheets, or hoping your hacky Squarespace or Shopify set up will cut it. Set inventory for each item and never worry about over-selling again.
Control the flow of customers: you can limit how many customers come and when. If your pickup space or parking is limited or you’re serving hot food to be enjoyed on the spot - this ones for you.
Lit marketing: drops create a sense of FOMO, which often spurs word-of-mouth among customers, and keeps people coming back.
How drops benefit the customer
Drops also have a slew of benefits for your customers.
Skip the line: if you’ve got walk-up customers lined up waiting to order and pay, customers who’ve pre-ordered can skip the line.
Guaranteed order: customers get the peace of mind that their order is secure, vs walking-in, possibly after you’ve sold out.
Always in the loop: customers don’t have to rely on seeing your latest post on Instagram or checking your website to know when your next drop is. When they subscribe to your Hotplate storefront, they’ll never miss a drop thanks to automated text notifications.
Fun vibes: drops are fun! (At least on Hotplate they are.) Between the pre-drop anonymous chat, the rush of trying to get what you want, we’ve seen this become a hyper-social, competitive, and celebratory experience.
Customers might feel heartbroken if they miss out on an order several weeks in a row, but we’ve found that the folks who care the most will continue to come back.
Can I do my own drop?
Yes 😎
Go ahead and create a Hotplate account for free, or if you want a little more info before getting started, feel free to book a call with our founder, Rishi, to learn more.
Looking for more reading?
Be sure to read:
The personal story of why we exist
The future of food we’re enabling
The overview of what our product actually does (fun! I promise!)
