Domino’s is crushing it online so a startup got $15 million to help pizzerias fight back
Jason Del Rey – May
GGV Capital is leading the round into New York City-based Slice.
Staten Island, New York is not known for tech startups. Luckily for Ilir Sela, it is known for its pizza.
The Staten Island resident got his start by building websites for local pizza shops owned by some friends and family. After years of bootstrapping, he recently raised $15 million for his startup Slice, which aims to help pizzerias convert from phone orders to digital orders, and battle back against the digital dominance of Domino’s along the way.
The round is being led by GGV Capital, the investment firm that has taken stakes in fast-growing app-based marketplaces like Wish, OfferUp and Poshmark. Slice had previously raised a small A-round investment from Primary Venture Partners.
“In order for independent pizzerias to thrive, they have to adapt to digital,” Sela said in an interview. “You have to allow your customers to order online.”
Slice operates both a website and an app…
…that lets people search for pizzerias in their area – over 6,000 nationwide — and place an order online. The pizzerias handle deliveries themselves and pay a flat fee of $1.95 per order to Slice, no matter the size, whereas many other online ordering services charge a percentage of the sale. With Slice, customers don’t pay anything extra, unless their local pizza shop charges a delivery fee.
A common response — which I had — is to assume that sites like GrubHub and its subsidiary Seamless already do a good job in this category.
But one piece of the argument Sela makes, which I sort of buy, is that when someone is either in the mood for pizza or wants the convenience of it for a big group, they’re specifically looking for pizza. So a standalone ordering app for that category of food can work. Pizza sales were expected to reach $45 billion in the U.S. alone last year.
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