OU Delivery bringing in big bucks by providing students with door-to-door service from Athens establishments
Whether your heart desires Chipotle, condoms or a new pair of cleats — OU Delivery will get them to you with just a few clicks.
While certain Uptown establishments already offer delivery services, the student start-up OU Delivery, created by Aaron Hoffman, allows students to order food and just about any other item to their doorstep (or dorm stoop).
The team will pick up or deliver nearly anything within a 15-mile radius for $4 a delivery cost, and most orders can be delivered between 30 minutes to an hour.
“I always saw a vision about (opening a business), but didn’t think it would happen this quick,” said Hoffman, a junior studying economics.
The idea wasn’t initially well received, Hoffman said, who was told it was a dumb idea by his now-business partner John Zinno, a junior studying economics. But Hoffman, Zinno and Tucker Holland, a sophomore studying restaurant, hotel and tourism, are working together running the business.
All three men have clear responsibilities to keep it functioning – Holland primarily does marketing and social media, and Hoffman and Zinno hold up the administrative end.
The business was incorporated on Dec. 7, 2013, and made into a legitimate business. In the following 16 weeks of Spring Semester, the team delivered $125,000 worth of products.
After taking the summer off from deliveries, the business officially opened on Monday for Fall Semester. This year will see a variety of new additions for the company, including a new website that was launched one week ago.
Customers are able to go to its website, ouruniversitydelivery.com, to place their orders and for now will offer $1 off each order when placed online. Previously, all orders were placed through mobile devices, but developing a mobile app is in the works, Hoffman said.
Delivery orders from Chipotle account for nearly half of the deliveries, but other favorites include Taco Bell, Bagel Street Deli and Big Mamma’s.
“Companies really like having us,” said Holland, who mentioned many businesses allow the drivers to skip to the front of the lines during busy times.
As of now, the OU Delivery staff has seven people, but Hoffman intends to double or triple that number when the weather gets bad, typically when the business is busiest.
“We’ve had to deliver some pretty funny things,” Hoffman said. “One guy had a very specific order for a pair of cleats. … Contraceptives and Plan B are pretty popular, too.”
While the company has a good system going now, the early days of OU Delivery were filled with their fair share of problems.
“I remember last year, it was so snowy and we got 20 or 30 orders behind,” Hoffman said. “It was the most stressful thing.”
The group began the business by walking or riding their bikes to all deliveries. Along with the struggles of getting the deliveries out, the team had many conflicts between being full-time students, rushing their fraternities and opening a business.
“My grades took a turn,” Holland said. “We weren’t even making money at first — we just had to do it.”
Now, OU Delivery does between 200 and 400 deliveries a week.
For the future, the group is looking into getting a taxi license, opening more stores throughout Ohio and working more with Ohio University.
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