Fitbar is one of the leading healthy meal planning services in the UAE and has been growing its customer base at a steady pace, and expanding its operations across the Emirates.
As it grew, it became evident that simply relying on its in-house team for planning and managing all deliveries was not feasible — the resource requirements were simply too demanding, and the manual nature of operations left potential for issues to frequently arise.
To maintain its unwavering commitment to its clientele, Fitbar turned to Yango Delivery for a technology-driven last mile logistics solution. Increased delivery success rates have translated to enhanced customer satisfaction and better retention, while a host of new technology-powered features pave the way for new and innovative customer experiences, conveniences and cost savings, to be unlocked.
‘Eat good, Feel good, Look good’ — this is the tagline that welcomes users to the homepage of UAE-based curated meal plan provider, Fitbar. And while today, healthy meals are readily available to the country’s calorie-conscious consumers, the company’s unwavering focus on maximising taste and affordability, place it in a league of its own.
There’s little surprise therefore that in just six years, it has grown to become a market leader in the space, with a constantly expanding customer base, and operations across all Emirates.
While Fitbar’s strengths lie in the taste, affordability, and healthiness of its meals, consistent, timely delivery also plays an outsized role in customer satisfaction.
“Our customers tend to have very specific dietary requirements based on their health and fitness goals and our service is finely tuned to empowering them to achieve these,” says Bothaina Yasser, business development manager & co-founder at Fitbar. “Customers can’t benefit from meals they don’t receive. So last mile logistics is an inherently critical aspect of our industry.”
Recognising this, Fitbar has prioritised delivery since its inception and while it worked with third-party logistics providers to make the actual deliveries, the company had two dedicated internal resources for the management of these partners. But as business grew, lack of innovation from delivery partners put an increasing strain on these personnel.
“Planning routes, setting delivery schedules, communicating with drivers, accommodating special delivery requests by customers — we had to do it all ourselves, manually,” explains Ahmed Yasser, co-founder and CEO at Fitbar.
This had a direct impact on Fitbar’s ability to scale at a pace that matched its ambition and the growing popularity of its service.
“We never compromise on customer satisfaction, so we knew if we were to expand, we needed a better delivery solution,” says Ahmed.
Fitbar knew that without a technology-oriented approach, adding more resources would offer little more than a temporary fix. “There’s a limit to the scale that can be effectively reached with a manual approach — as delivery volume increases, complexity scales exponentially,” says Ahmed. So when Yango Delivery approached Fitbar with a last mile logistics solution, based on a proven technology platform, the choice was clear.
This platform has served to address all the challenges that Fitbar faced with previous partners. Once Fitbar provides Yango Delivery with a list of all orders that need to be delivered, optimised schedules and routes are automatically generated, based on Yango Delivery’s proprietary algorithm that takes into account factors such as delivery location, potential routes, as well as live traffic conditions.
“We are deeply committed to running our operations in the most sustainable manner possible, and we take pride in knowing that Yango Delivery helps us minimise the effective fuel consumption of our fleet,” says Bothaina.
With Yango Delivery, riders can be tracked in real-time. They can conveniently record proof of delivery by clicking a picture that is automatically uploaded to the platform. And communication between Fitbar’s customer service agents and riders too has been streamlined.
“This has elevated our customer experience to the next level. We’re able to confidently update our clients with the ETA for their delivery. And if they have any special requests, then communicating these to our drivers, and making the necessary updates to their schedule and route is greatly simplified,” says Ahmed. “As a result, we now only have one internal resource working with Yango Delivery to manage all the delivery operations.”
Yango Delivery’s world-class technology is matched by its commitment to customer service.
“They were one of the only providers who were willing to offer same day pick-up, and delivery within our long-standing 5pm to 10pm time slot. We didn’t have to make unwanted changes to our business model,” says Bothaina. “In fact, with their support, we have increased the frequency of deliveries from three times per week to daily — which today is something that customers in the region expect.”
On a daily basis, Fitbar provides customised, healthy meals to nearly 400 clients. “Yango Delivery has enabled us to deliver these meals with a 95% success rate and as our partnership grows, we are on track to achieve a near-100% success rate very soon,” says Bothaina. “We also have plans to launch our mobile app, and Yango Delivery enables us to add a real-time tracking feature for a premium customer experience.”
Commenting on the value that the support of a trusted delivery partner brings to the business, Ahmed says, “Our expertise lies in creating customised, flavourful, and healthy meal plans for our clients. By alleviating the burden of managing logistics, Yango Delivery has enabled us to focus on our core business, freeing up our time to develop growth strategies, engage with investors and stakeholders, streamline our internal operations, and build impactful marketing campaigns.”
“They are a partner that is clearly committed to our success. The technology is there. The service commitment is there,” says Ahmed. “Thanks to Yango Delivery, our ability to retain customers has been enhanced and this has a direct impact on our bottom line.”
