A Phoenix-based startup aims to tap into the growing restaurant delivery market with its platform that combines gaming, online ordering and cryptocurrency payments.
Devour’s web3-based app provides a digital restaurant ordering experience similar to DoorDash or Uber Eats, but incorporates games and rewards to drive customer loyalty and engagement, said company co-founder and CEO Shelly Rupel.
Devour has been in a “community beta” phase over the past year and has more than 1,500 restaurants on its platform nationwide, including a handful in Phoenix. The app hosts somewhere between 2,000 and 2,500 users in its test markets that include Los Angeles, Miami and Chicago, Rupel said.
“We're getting ready to expand that restaurant base coast-to-coast. So that count will significantly go up from the 1,500 range to 10,000, 20,000, 30,000,” she said. “And that's going to happen pretty quickly. With that, we'll be ready to really expand and grow users of the platform as well.”
Devour's expansion plans come as hiring in the startup space has decreased considerably since the peaks of 2021 and 2022. Valley startups are still creating buzz with smart pet doors and tech-savvy financial services despite a challenging funding market.
Devour users can earn points or perks redeemable at participating restaurants by playing games and placing orders within the DevourGO platform, which also features communities revolving around NFT collections and player leaderboards powered by blockchain technology.
In addition, users have an option to pay for restaurant orders with cryptocurrency, including the company’s own DevourPAY digital tokens or through checkout with Coinbase, which is one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the U.S.
Cryptocurrency payments, however, are still in an “early adoption” mode among users, with popularity likely to rise in the future, Rupel said.
“You'll see a tremendous growth spurt there," she said. "There’s been a longstanding interest in being able to use crypto for commerce, but there aren't a lot of solutions like Devour out there."
Want to read more about Phoenix's startup scene? Check out AZ Inno's 10 Startups to Watch in 2024.
Devour is working to forge strategic partnerships with gaming and web3 studios to potentially introduce its platform into games — think augmented reality menus in virtual worlds, voice-activated orders during live stream events or limited edition NFTs specific to restaurants that carry a perk and drive brand loyalty.
In March, Devour was among three finalists in the Restaurant Technology Network’s Startup Alley pitch competition. The company was selected from more than 60 applicants to participate in the pitch competition at the Multi-Unit Restaurant Technology Conference (MURTEC) held in Las Vegas.
“That was very exciting for us. MURTEC is a very well-known technology conference within the restaurant industry,” Rupel said. “… The acknowledgement of what we’re building and the value of it from the restaurant industry and technology perspective — it was another momentum builder for us and affirmation of the innovation that we’re bringing to the industry.”
'A beachhead market'
Rupel is an entrepreneur with more than 30 years of experience in the restaurant, point-of-sale and retail technology industries. Prior to Devour, she was senior director of strategic partnerships for PAR Technology and held executive roles at ItsaCheckmate and Toast.
In 2021, she co-founded Devour with the premise that the restaurant industry needs a “digital bridge” to Gen Z – a generation that has grown up in a world of smartphones, video games and social media.
As Rupel was conceptualizing Devour’s platform, she realized gaming was a “beachhead market” with an estimated 212 million people nationwide who play video games once a week, she said.
At the same time, restaurant delivery apps had gained enormous market traction during the pandemic, sparking Rupel's idea to combine gaming and online restaurant delivery.
Devour publicly launched its DevourGO smartphone app in 2023. The company also has a traditional online ordering website.
Devour has more than a dozen employees, some of whom work remotely. It also employs workers on a fractional basis, Rupel said.
The startup is primarily bootstrapped but raised $1 million from undisclosed investors in 2023. It plans to pursue another round of funding in the near future, Rupel said.
“We will be doing a seed round,” she said. "I haven’t set the date for when we’ll open that up but it will be sometime within the next couple of months.”
In addition to scaling its platform and user base, Devour's primary focus is forging partnerships with restaurants, gaming franchises and consumer packaged goods brands.
“We've got a number of potential large strategic partnership initiatives and when one of those pops, we really better be ready as a company to scale and grow," Rupel said. "We've been working hard to put ourselves in the position to be ready for that.”
