Juri Loninia: Fried Chicken Headquarters co-owner says it has no choice but to take the hit with Uber Eats losses

An Auckland restaurant is pleading customers to not order from them through Uber Eats.  

Henderson's Fried Chicken Headquarters says every order through the service loses it money on fees.  

It was once left with just $84 dollars from $800 in sales.  

Co-owner Juri Loninia told Andrew Dickens it has no choice but to take the hit. 

“Unfortunately, as a small business, we can’t just switch off Uber and call it a day, because it helps us with exposure.” 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Right, let's talk about Uber eats. A Auckland eatery is
sending out a SOS to customers to stop using Uber eats.
And this is a Friday, this is a takeaway night.
Fried Chicken Headquarters in Henderson says every order is losing money.
It's all because of the fees and admin costs that
Uber eats charge. And so now the eatery is calling
for customers to order in store, threatening that they might

(00:22):
have to close because they're not getting enough business. Jury
La Nina is the co owner of Fried Chicken Headquarters
and it's with us now. Hello Judy, yep, how good
is your chicken? Mate?

Speaker 2 (00:36):
You can come try it yourself?

Speaker 1 (00:37):
Yeah? Can I order it on Uber eats? No, I can't.
You don't like uber eats. Why don't you like uber eats?

Speaker 2 (00:43):
Well, we had a report that we received back in
twenty first March twenty twenty four. It was on a Saturday.
We had some sales that equated roughly to four hundred
and nineteen dollars and also Uber eats fees and commission
we deducted all the way down to three hundred and

(01:03):
fourteen dollars.

Speaker 3 (01:04):
However, that's not all the fees on aubery. So just
to break it down just really quickly, because I know
it's a lot of numbers, I'm just going to add
it up together. There's the additional fees that went to
three hundred and thirteen dollars. We minus that with our
net sails, which we come down to a dollar. A dollar.

Speaker 1 (01:28):
You made a dollar from a day's business. That's right,
that's not good business. I'm looking at you, I'm looking.
I've got your figures here between the twenty six and
the twenty eighth. So you talk to me about one day.
For three days were talking eight hundred and twenty bucks
worth of sales. They had two hundred and twenty five
bucks and fees. Then, for some reason, four hundred and
seven to pay to advertise through Uber, each off four

(01:49):
Uber eats to advertise you GST is thirty three bucks,
charge is sixty eight bucks on whatever. And in the end,
at of selling eight hundred and twenty dollars worth of
Great Chicken, you got just any dollars and eleven cents. Now,
my question for you is this doesn't sound economically sensible.
Why did you agree to sign up to Uber eats.

Speaker 3 (02:08):
Well, unfortunately, as a small business.

Speaker 2 (02:12):
We can't just switch off Uber and call it a
day because it helps us.

Speaker 1 (02:16):
With exposure, right, so you get more business, but you're
not making any money. So what you're trying to do
now is get people to go off the Uber eats
and just come straight to your store. But that's not
why they did it in the first place. Do you
increase the cost of Uber eats takeaways to the customers
to then counteract the charges that Uber Eats are hitting

(02:39):
you with.

Speaker 2 (02:41):
No, it is a slight markup, but that's from Uber.

Speaker 1 (02:45):
Yeah, because we've had some talkback during the course of
the week, over the course of the day about this,
and some restauranteurs are saying, well, obviously, what we do
is we put the prices up to cover the charges
that Uber eat sits us with. So you know, some
people are paying thirty bucks for a bacon butty. They
don't mind because they're drunk and they need the food,
right right.

Speaker 2 (03:06):
No, No, as far as we are aware, the reason
for changing and prices is just to compete with the
other businesses in our industry.

Speaker 1 (03:19):
So you just wanting people to come in and, like
like the old days, on a Friday, phone in the
order get dad to go down to what's your what's
your company called? Coming wit? I forgot Well Fried Chicken
headquarters in Henderson. Pick up some awesome chicken and come
on home and forget about the Uber eats. That's all
you want?

Speaker 2 (03:35):
A yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, we would much prefer that.

Speaker 1 (03:41):
Yeah, okay, all right, and thank you for your time, Jerry,
and I wish you a very successful Friday and Saturday night.
It's obviously a big night for you. But you know,
what do you think? Ninety two ninety two? The charges
seem extraordinary? Uber eats is based overseas the old takeaways.
You know, I've never used uber eats for this very reason.
So we'll talk a bit more about this later.

Speaker 3 (04:02):
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