The stacked discount

A delivery app's settlement statement is the least read document in a small restaurant, and in November it is the most expensive one.

The arithmetic on a forty-riyal burger, in round numbers. The app takes its commission off the menu price; call it a quarter; the real figure depends on the contract. That leaves thirty. Then the November campaign invitation arrives: join the platform-wide offer, thirty percent to the customer, and the app will feature you. The thirty percent comes off the menu price, not off the app's share. The customer pays twenty-eight, the app keeps its ten, and the kitchen is handed eighteen riyals for a burger whose meat, bun, box and the person at the grill cost more than that.

The maths went negative before the packaging.

I have sat with enough small operators to know why they say yes anyway. The campaign has a page, a push notification, a place in the carousel, and the fear is being the one restaurant not on it. The fear is well founded, and it misses who the event is for. The app is buying share for the app, and the restaurant pays for it with two discounts stacked on the same order.

The alternative is smaller than most people are willing to accept.

One dish, the one with the margin and the reputation. One hour, the empty one, three to four on a weekday. One broadcast list on the messaging app, made of people who have already eaten here and left their number on a card by the till. An offer to them, at that hour, on that dish, with the full price still standing on the app.

Nobody will feature it. It will also not go negative, and it belongs to the person who sends it.

The app's November is the app's. The operator's smallest November is the only one worth owning, and it is not too small.