Opening up about Zomato's much-talked-about 'Pure Veg Mode', its founder and CEO Deepinder Goyal has revealed why his company launched the new fleet.
In an interview, he said the decision to introduced 'veg-only' options was reached after a market survey participated by 1,600 users saw a majority of them preferring 'pure veg' food. The respondents cited spiritual reasons rather than religion or caste, according to The Economic Times.
"We did a large survey of people who are more than 50 years old. An overwhelming majority said they needed a veg-only option and preferred veg-only restaurants. It was a large customer segment… So, we launched it. We had not expected such an uproar. The survey had 1,600 (people) and about 72 percent of people said that they wanted veg-only delivery," Goyal said in the interview.
On the day of Zomato's launch of its 'pure veg' fleet, the company drew flak for being 'casteist' and many social media users warned that the green uniforms for the new fleet will result in some socities denying entry for regular delivery partners in red uniform.
Following the backlash, Goyal said the online food aggrgator and delivery platform is rolling back its decision to introduce green uniform, saying all delivery partners will don the red attire. The 'pure veg' fleet was renamed as 'veg only' later. "All our riders — both our regular fleet, and our fleet for vegetarians, will wear the colour red," he said earlier.
