Gorillas (company)

Last updated

Gorillas
Industry Online platform for convenience delivery
Founded
  • May 2020;4 years ago (2020-05),
  • in Berlin, Germany
Founders
  • Jörg Kattner
  • Kağan Sümer
  • Ronny Shibley (co-founder)
DefunctMay 2024
Headquarters
Berlin
,
Germany
Areas served
 Germany, Netherlands, United Kingdom, United States
Owner
  • Independent (2020–22)
  • Getir [1] (2022–present)
Number of employees
  • ~10,000
  • (as of November 2022) [2]
Website gorillas.io/en

Gorillas was a German ultrafast grocery delivery company which used dark stores between its founding in 2020 and its end in May 2024. [3] Users could order grocery products through the Gorillas app.

Contents

In December 2022, the company was acquired by Getir. [4] [1] As of July 2023, it operates in around 35 cities from roughly 130 locations in four countries. It sold its Belgium operations to Efarmz and withdrew from Italy, Spain, Denmark, and most recently France. [5] [6] [7]

Gorillas bikes outside one of its dark stores Gorillas bikes outside Brixton dark store July 2021.jpg
Gorillas bikes outside one of its dark stores

In June 2023, it was announced that Getir-owned Gorillas would begin withdrawing from France. In April 2024, Getir and Gorillas announced their withdrawal from all its operating locations with only Getir remaining in operation in its home market of Turkey. [8]

History

The company was founded in May 2020 by Kağan Sümer, Jörg Kattner, Jeff Hester, and Ronny Shibley in Berlin. They aimed to deliver groceries and other supermarket goods ordered through its app by bike courier, charging supermarket prices.

Initially starting in Berlin, it rapidly spread to dozens of European cities and expanded in America. In 2022, Gorillas operated in multiple cities including Amsterdam, London, Paris, Munich and New York, USA. [9]

In December 2020, the company raised $44 million in Series A funding, followed by $290 million in Series B funding in March 2021 and almost $1 billion in Series C funding in October 2021. [10] [11] [12] The last investment round, valued the startup at 1 billion, making it a unicorn in just 9 months, the fastest company in Germany to do so. [13]

Sümer stated in 2022 that his aim was to raise $700 million of new financing to expand the company and make it profitable. [14] [15]

In June 2022, Gorillas announced it would launch its own products for sale in Germany, France, the Netherlands and England. Items sold under Gorillas' label include spreads, pasta, coffee and beer. [16]

Following its rapid expansion in the first two years of its existence, Gorillas failed to live up to financial expectations. As a consequence, in 2022, it ended operations in Belgium, Italy and Spain. In England, it closed all operations with the exception of those in London. It also cancelled plans to enter other markets such as Switzerland and Australia. [17]

In December 2022, Getir, a competitor based in Istanbul, acquired Gorillas for $1.2 billion. [4] [1] [18]

Business model

Gorillas' slogan is faster than you, emphasizing speedy delivery. [10]

The business model is based on that of goPuff, which was founded in Philadelphia in 2013. [19]

Gorillas sells over 2000 products including fresh fruit and vegetables, drinks and some household items, which are delivered by bicycle couriers. Food not sold within the best-before date is either given employees, given to charity or local food banks, or sold to customers at a significant discount.

Controversies

Some employees have criticized Gorillas for bad working conditions, including inadequate equipment, pressure to deliver quickly, and deliveries weighing too much, causing many to complain of back pain. Riders also report not being paid correctly or on time. [20]

In October 2021 Gorillas fired 350 employees in Berlin for participating in a wildcat strike. [21] According to the Gorillas Workers Collective, which "represents the company's non-unionised delivery workers". [22]

In November 2021 the company purchased 1,200 state-of-the-art e-bikes specially designed to meet its cyclists' needs and renewed all its cyclists' equipment including PPE. [23] The company said that it offered its 10,000 employees benefits including health insurance, a salary above the minimum wage, paid leave and a complete riders' kit. In Germany, the Netherlands and England, Gorillas introduced a bonus scheme for its riders. [24]

In February 2023, The Independent reported that Gorillas' “Whatever London Wants” advertising campaign had been "banned over ‘irresponsible’ drug, sex and alcohol content" and for "featuring 'irresponsible' references to drug use and excessive alcohol consumption." The watchdog stated "that the adverts normalised illicit drug use and harmful drinking." [25]

Investments

Gorillas has been the focus of high-value investments since it was founded. Gorillas' value in round A funds rose by $44 million in December 2020, in round B financing by $290 million in March 2021, and in round C funds by approximately $1 billion in October 2021. The company acquired French competitor Frichti and entered into an alliance with Just Eat. [26] [27] [28]

Locations

Gorillas used to operate in around 35 cities across four countries, prior to it closing permanently in May 2024.

CountryCities
Germany Augsburg, Berlin, Bonn, Bremen, Cologne, Darmstadt, Dresden, Düsseldorf, Essen, Frankfurt, Fürth, Hamburg, Hannover, Heidelberg, Karlsruhe, Leipzig, Mannheim, Munich, Nuremberg, Offenbach, Stuttgart
Netherlands Amsterdam, Arnhem, The Hague, Haarlem, Nijmegen, Rotterdam, Utrecht
United Kingdom London
United States New York City

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Delivery Hero</span> Food delivery company based in Berlin

Delivery Hero SE is a German multinational online food ordering and food delivery company based in Berlin, Germany. Founded in 2011, the company operates in 70+ countries internationally in Europe, Asia, Africa, Latin and South America, and the Middle East, and partners with 500,000+ restaurants. Delivery Hero has increasingly branched out beyond food delivery, and is a leading player in the emerging category of quick commerce, which delivers small batch orders in under an hour.

Foodpanda is a Singaporean online food and grocery delivery platform owned by Berlin-based Delivery Hero. Foodpanda operates as the lead brand for Delivery Hero in Asia, with its headquarters in Singapore. It is currently the largest food and grocery delivery platform in Asia, outside of China, operating in 11 markets across Asia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">GetYourGuide</span> Website where tourists can book activities

GetYourGuide is a Berlin-based startup online marketplace for travel activities. GetYourGuide sells tours and excursions, activities including cooking classes, and tickets to tourist attractions. It offers more than 100,000 products worldwide from more than 20,000 supply partners.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Blinkit</span> Indian quick-commerce company Engaged in trademark dispute.

Blinkit Commerce Private Limited, d/b/a Blinkit and formerly Grofers, is an Indian quick-commerce service. It was founded in December 2013 and is based out of Gurgaon.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Instacart</span> Internet-based grocery delivery service

Maplebear Inc., doing business as Instacart, is an American delivery company based in San Francisco that operates a grocery delivery and pick-up service in the United States and Canada accessible via a website and mobile app. It allows customers to order groceries from participating retailers with the shopping being done by a personal shopper. The company also provides alcohol delivery in states and provinces where it is allowed. It has partnerships with 1,500 retail banners comprising 85,000 stores. Instacart reaches nearly 98% of SNAP households, offering delivery services from nearly 180 retail banners, including ALDI, Food Lion, Publix, The Save Mart Companies and Walgreens, spanning more than 30,000 stores across all 50 states and Washington D.C. Since its founding, Instacart Marketplace has powered more than $100 billion of GTV and over 900 million orders with approximately 20 billion items ordered.

DoorDash, Inc. is an American company operating online food ordering and food delivery. It trades under the symbol DASH. With a 56% market share, DoorDash is the largest food delivery platform in the United States. It also has a 60% market share in the convenience delivery category. As of December 31, 2020, the platform was used by 450,000 merchants, 20,000,000 consumers, and one million delivery couriers.

Deliveroo is a British online food delivery company founded by Will Shu and Greg Orlowski in 2013 in London, England. It operates in the United Kingdom, France, Belgium, Ireland, Italy, Singapore, Hong Kong, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, and Qatar. It formerly operated in Germany, Taiwan, Spain, the Netherlands, and Australia. Its subsidiary operation, Deliveroo Editions operates dark kitchens for the preparation of delivery-only meals.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bolt (company)</span> Peer-to-peer ridesharing, food delivery

Bolt is an Estonian mobility company that offers ride-hailing, micromobility rental, food and grocery delivery, and carsharing services. The company is headquartered in Tallinn and operates in over 500 cities in more than 45 countries in Europe, Africa, Western Asia and Latin America. The company has more than 150 million customers and more than 3 million driver and courier partners. The company has plans for an initial public offering in 2025.

Careem is a Dubai-based super app with operations in over 70 cities, covering 10 countries across the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia regions. The company, which was valued at over US$2 billion in 2018, became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Uber after being acquired for $3.1 billion in January 2020. Careem expanded into the food delivery business with Careem Now in November 2018, which evolved into Careem Food as well as the rapid grocery delivery service Careem Quik in 2020, and launched a digital payment platform, Careem Pay in April 2022. In April 2023, Careem's Super App business was spun out into a new legal entity, which e& acquired a 50.03% stake in, while Uber maintains full ownership of Careem's ride-hailing business. The Super App currently offers 20 digital services in the UAE including ride-hailing, food, grocery, micromobility, DineOut, and a subscription-based service - Careem Plus, amongst others.

PT Gojek Indonesia is an Indonesian on-demand multi-service platform and digital payment technology group based in Jakarta. Gojek was first established in Indonesia in 2009 as a call center to connect consumers to courier delivery and two-wheeled ride-hailing services. Gojek launched its application in 2015 with only four services: GoRide, GoSend, GoShop, and GoFood. Valued at US$10 billion today, Gojek has transformed into a super app, providing more than 20 services.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Glovo</span> Spanish on-demand courier service

Glovo is a Spain-based, delivery app founded in 2014 by Oscar Pierre, and launched in 2015 by himself and Sacha Michaud following an initial round of funding. Since mid-2022, Glovo has been a part of the Delivery Hero Group, a publicly traded German company.

Gopuff Digital delivery service

GoBrands, Inc., doing business as Gopuff, is an American consumer goods and food delivery company headquartered in Philadelphia. The company operates in more than 650 US cities through approximately 500 microfulfillment centers as of October 2021. It also operates in the United Kingdom, following a takeover of Newcastle upon Tyne-based Fancy. As of July 2021, the company was valued at $15 billion.

Bird Global, Inc. is a micromobility company based in Miami, Florida. Founded in September 2017, Bird has distributed electric scooters designed for short-term rental to over 400 cities.

Nuro, Inc. is an American robotics company based in Mountain View, California. Founded by Jiajun Zhu and Dave Ferguson, Nuro develops autonomous delivery vehicles and is the first company to receive an autonomous exemption from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Monday.com Ltd. is a cloud-based platform that allows users to create their own applications and project management software. The product was launched in 2014 and in July 2019, the company raised $150 million, based on a $1.9 billion valuation. The company went public in June 2021 and is based in Tel Aviv, Israel.

Swiggy is an Indian online food ordering and delivery company. Founded in 2014, Swiggy is headquartered in Bangalore and operates in more than 580 Indian cities, as of July 2023. Besides food delivery, the platform also provides quick commerce services under the name Swiggy Instamart, and same-day package deliveries with Swiggy Genie.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Getir</span> Turkish on-demand food and grocery delivery start-up

Getir is a Turkish company, operating in several countries until 2024, founded as a startup company in 2015 that offers rapid on-demand delivery services for grocery items and a courier service for restaurant food deliveries, accessed via a mobile app.

The 2021 Gorillas strikes are a number of labour strikes and protests by workers of Gorillas, an on-demand grocery delivery company in Germany, in 2021.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Zepto (company)</span> Indian Q-commerce company

KiranaKart Technologies Private Limited doing business as Zepto is an Indian Q-commerce company headquartered in Mumbai, India. It was founded in July 2021 by Aadit Palicha and Kaivalya Vohra. As of August 2024, the company is valued at over $5 billion and operates over 250 dark-stores across ten metropolitan areas in India.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Tuncay, Ebru; Dey, Mrinmay (9 December 2022). "Turkish quick delivery company Getir to buy rival Gorillas in $1.2b deal". DealStreetAsia.
  2. ↑ "Gorillas held its first ever Partner Conference". Gorillas Blog. 5 October 2022.
  3. ↑ Darmody, Jenny (26 March 2021). "Grocery delivery start-up Gorillas hits unicorn status". Silicon Republic.
  4. 1 2 Cantrill, Aggi; Kandemir, Asli; Tan, Gillian (9 December 2022). "Rapid-Delivery Startup Getir Buys Rival Gorillas in $1.2 Billion Deal". Bloomberg. Retrieved 9 December 2022.
  5. ↑ "Gorillas announces deal with Efarmz in Belgium". Gorillas Blog. 23 June 2022.
  6. ↑ Simonetta, Biagio (4 July 2022). "Gorillas lascia l'Italia e licenzia i suoi dipendenti" [Gorillas leaves Italy and fires its employees]. Il Sole 24 Ore (in Italian).
  7. ↑ "Groupe Casino: Casino Group and Gorillas announce the signing of a strategic memorandum of understanding". Bloomberg. 4 November 2021.
  8. ↑ Knieps, Lisa Ksienrzyk, Stephan (24 April 2024). "Lieferdienst: Getir und Gorillas verschwinden Mitte Mai aus Deutschland". www.wiwo.de (in German). Retrieved 29 April 2024.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  9. ↑ "Gorillas is carbon neutral in all own operations". Gorillas Blog. 14 March 2022.
  10. 1 2 O'Hear, Steve (11 December 2020). "Gorillas, the on-demand grocery delivery startup taking Berlin by storm, has raised $44M Series A". TechCrunch.
  11. ↑ O'Hear, Steve (25 March 2021). "Gorillas, the on-demand grocery delivery startup, raises $290M and 'surpasses' $1B valuation". TechCrunch.
  12. ↑ Lomas, Natasha (19 October 2021). "Gorillas grabs 'close to' $1BN, Series C values the on-demand grocery delivery biz at $2.1BN". TechCrunch.
  13. ↑ Ksienrzyk, Lisa (31 March 2021). "Exklusiv: Gorillas steigt mit 245-Millionen-Runde zum Unicorn auf" [Exclusive: Gorillas rises to Unicorn with 245 million round]. Business Insider (in German).
  14. ↑ Levingston, Ivan; Tan, Gillian; Tse, Crystal (25 February 2022). "Startup Gorillas Planning to Raise $700 Million of New Funding". Bloomberg.
  15. ↑ "Delivery Startup Gorillas Looks to Raise $700M". PYMNTS. 27 February 2022. Retrieved 28 February 2022.
  16. ↑ "Gorillas enters the private label market". Gorillas Blog. 6 June 2022.
  17. ↑ Lunden, Ingrid (24 May 2022). "Berlin's Gorillas lays off 300, exits four markets". TechCrunch. Retrieved 17 April 2023.
  18. ↑ Cameron, Isabel (1 March 2023). "Getir to cut hundreds of jobs as it delays office move". Charged. Retrieved 13 March 2023.
  19. ↑ Schader, Peer (8 June 2020). "Der rollende Supermarkt: Gorillas verspricht die 10-Minuten-Lebensmittel-Lieferung in Berlin" [The rolling supermarket: Gorillas promise 10-minute food delivery in Berlin]. Supermarktblog (in German). Retrieved 21 January 2022.
  20. ↑ Geiger, Gabriel (24 May 2021). "Riders for Europe's Delivery 'Unicorn' Report Grueling Delivery Times and Back Pain". vice.com. Vice. Retrieved 5 December 2021.
  21. ↑ Geiger, Gabriel (5 October 2021). "Gorillas Delivery App Fires Workers for Striking". vice.com. Vice. Retrieved 5 December 2021.
  22. ↑ Bateman, Tom (8 October 2021). "Gorillas delivery app fires hundreds of Berlin workers for strikes over pay and working conditions". euronews.com. Euronews. Retrieved 5 December 2021.
  23. ↑ "Gorillas is renewing its fleet with 1,200 e-bikes". Gorillas Blog. Berlin. 23 November 2021.
  24. ↑ "Riders share their feedback on new bonus program". Gorillas Blog. 14 January 2022.
  25. ↑ Gregory, Andy (16 February 2023). "Adverts for food delivery service banned over 'irresponsible' drug, sex and alcohol content". The Independent. Retrieved 16 February 2023.
  26. ↑ Dillet, Romain (24 January 2022). "Gorillas to acquire Frichti in latest instant grocery consolidation". TechCrunch.
  27. ↑ Cameron, Isabel (11 March 2022). "Gorillas finalises Frichti acquisition". Charged.
  28. ↑ Neerman, Pauline (10 March 2022). "Gorillas acquires Frichti, joins Just Eat collaboration". RetailDetail.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.