Highlights — TLDR

1. Southern-Inspired Beginnings: Thunderbird Chicken, founded by Matt Harris, started in 2017 in London, inspired by the flavors of America's Deep South. The journey began with a food truck, BBQ Lab, which gained popularity and led to the creation of Thunderbird Chicken.

2. Delivery and Pickup Focus: While offering limited dine-in options, Thunderbird Chicken primarily caters to delivery and pick-up customers, partnering with Deliveroo, Uber Eats, Just Eat, and offering a click-and-collect feature.

3. Streamlining Operations with Deliverect: Thunderbird Chicken utilizes Deliverect to manage orders across multiple platforms efficiently, eliminating the need for manual entry and focusing on timely food preparation and service.

4. Menu Flexibility and Real-Time Updates: With Deliverect, Thunderbird Chicken can quickly update their menu and easily propagate changes to their delivery partners, ensuring consistency and responsiveness to customer needs.

5. Future Expansion Plans: The success and unique offering of Thunderbird Chicken have spurred plans for further expansion within and outside London, with Deliverect playing a crucial role in scaling operations and exploring new opportunities.

How Deliverect helps give wings to Thunderbird Fried Chicken

London is a tricky market space for restaurants, and a range of delivery channels flourish in the capital of the UK. Thunderbird Chicken, established by a British foodie fan of America’s Deep South, strives to offer the vivid flavors of the region to Londoners through counter-service locations spread across the city. The delivery channel aggregation advantages of Deliverect give the company a leg – or more appropriately, a wing – up.

From food truck to successful franchise

Thunderbird Chicken debuted in 2017 after its founder, Matt Harris, returned from a short stint in the southern United States, where he spent several years enjoying the fried chicken and BBQ the area is famed for.“The key to success? Making world-class food, selecting the right packaging and getting it to the customer’s doorstep as quickly as possible.”

“Matt approaches food and cooking at the molecular level,” laughs Thunderbird Operations Manager Steph Brown. “He deconstructs the recipes he loves and then adds his own flair.”

As soon as he arrived back in the UK, he began experimenting with southern staples, particularly chicken and BBQ. Steph: “It just took off from there – his first foray into the restaurant industry was BBQ Lab, a food truck that ended up being a real hit. After he won the WingFest award for his buffalo chicken wings in 2015, momentum, followers and investors came next.” Thunderbird Chicken was born.

Catering to the needs of local customers

While Thunderbird Fried Chicken locations provide a limited number of booths for dine-in customers, much of its customer traffic comes via delivery and pick-up channels. “We operate 5+ different locations in London and currently work with Deliveroo, Uber Eats and Just Eat as our delivery partners,” Steph continues. “However, we also have our click & collect feature that we set up with the help of Deliverect.”

Click & collect enables customers to order their meals online and then pick them up in store instantly at a pre-defined moment.

“Lunchtime is sacred in London,” Steph goes on to say. “People don’t want to spend 10 minutes ordering and waiting for their food when they only get 30 minutes for lunch. Click & collect means that they can drop by when it suits their schedule, grab their meal and go.”

Working in this way makes timing crucial. Steph: “Deliverect frees us up from the burden of entering incoming tickets into the till. Instead, we focus on great food and perfect timing and the orders automatically go straight into the kitchens. Even more, it’s a simple process to update the menu from the back end – we can make changes quickly and Deliverect helps us propogate changes to our delivery partners, saving us time.”

Delivery process optimization as a key service

The success of Thunderbird Fried Chicken’s fantastic southern cooking and efficient business model has Matt and his team ambitiously planning future expansions.

“We anticipate opening additional branches here in London, and we will expand both within London and into areas outside the city. Deliverect will play an important role in our operations as we continue to scale up and seek out new opportunities for growth,” Steph concludes.