Listen to this episode on your phone here.
The food delivery industry has exploded over the last few years, but restaurants and customers have been complaining that fees are too high. In this episode, I chat with Zach Rash, the founder and CEO of Coco, a last-mile delivery service that deploys human-operated sidewalk robots to deliver items from merchants to customers. We talk about Coco, where they’re operating, use cases, and more.
Intro to Zach Rash
- Co-Founder and CEO of Coco
- Human operated sidewalk robots that deliver items from merchants to customers
- At UCLA, came up with the idea for Coco
- Targeting people where delivery is a core part of their business
Coco Delivery
- Coco robots deliver food and groceries for merchants
- Started in Santa Monica, then moved throughout California and now into Texas
- Better delivery experience for merchants
- Allows them to deliver more cost-effectively
Coco Merchants / Use Cases
- What makes certain merchants successful at this?
- Packaging, in-store operations
- Merchants plug into Coco’s API
- 1 mile every 12 minutes, roughly (depending on stop lights, people walking)
Human-Operated Robots
- Human operators go through Pilot Academy!
- People who are good at video games are typically pretty good at this
- Hiring people everywhere
- Eliminates all the waiting for delivery operators
Future for Coco
- Build something that’s useful – learn from the merchant
- Constantly improving the experience for the merchants
- Expansion to other states, areas
- Goal is not to expand to car-size vehicles
Outro
- Big thanks to Zach for coming on the podcast and chatting about Coco with us!
Show Notes
- cocodelivery.com
- curbivore.co