By Dipo Olowookere
From Saturday, January 13, 2024, users of Chowdeck, a mobile application designed for ordering meals, grocery items, and medicine, from restaurants, stores and pharmacies in Nigeria, may need to part with N200 if they want to continue to have their orders packaged in the platform’s signature brown paper bags and stickers.
In a message to its users on Thursday, the co-founder and chief executive of Chowdeck, Mr Femi Aluko, emphasised that this fee is optional and would only be paid if a customer wants his orders to be packed in the brown paper bags with stickers.
He explained that this token was introduced because the company, which serves “hundreds of thousands of Chowstars across Lagos, Abuja, Ibadan, Port Harcourt, and Abeokuta, to mention a few,” has been finding it difficult to get the items from its suppliers.
According to him, high production costs caused by rising inflation and energy expenses have affected the producers of paper bags and stickers, who have not been able to meet the rising demand.
“At the current scale of our daily demand, it’s become increasingly difficult for our vendors to meet up with our daily targets.
“As such, we have chosen to phase out the widespread use of paper bags and stickers to prioritise high-quality production services that can meet our ginormous demand,” a part of the statement obtained by Business Post noted.
Mr Aluko further stated that, “We are set to begin phasing out the use of paper bags and stickers as early as Saturday, January 13, 2024.
“For the Chowstars who have grown accustomed to our signature packaging, and cannot imagine being served without our brown bags and stickers, we have a simple solution for you!
“We have decided to introduce a small optional packaging fee of N200 for bags and stickers — and all you have to do is select it at checkout!”
The CEO said deciding on charging a fee for the paper bags and stickers was very difficult, as the team tried different options without success.
“We have explored recycling the bags, and the output of that effort is insignificant compared to the sheer size of bags that we need to keep up delivering with the bags. Until we can, we will phase out the widespread use of paper bags and stickers,” he said.
While thanking its users “for choosing Chowdeck,” he assured that the firm will not compromise on high standards, which he said is “one of our core values.”
