After Zomato introduced the Green Zomato Initiative where there will be an All Veg Delivery Fleet wearing Green Uniforms which will identify the veg food delivery personnel, they received major backlash.
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The initiative was bought by Zomato, considering the high percentage of Vegetarians in India and how they would prefer food segregation and a veg delivery partner. Zomato also introduced a green uniform and green bags for the vegetarian delivery partner. In contrast, the non-vegetarian partners will continue to wear the red uniform and carry the red bag.
Source: The Times Of India
The complaint comes from its users who say that their food choices will be revealed to their Landlords and employers, which might cause problems given that they would have issues with non-vegetarians.
People took it to the internet to complain about how Zomato is turning out to be the modern casteist by creating a rift between the Vegetarians and the Non-Vegetarians, some people went on to say that this might even be an unsafe move for the delivery partner as non-veg delivery partners may get beaten up during festival days.
After the major backlash received by Zomato, they pulled back on the initiative and said that they didn’t realize the complications of this initiative, they clarified that the delivery partners will not wear green uniforms but it will be an app-only feature. The CEO and Co-founder took to “X” to Clarify he wrote “Update on our pure veg fleet — While we are going to continue to have a fleet for vegetarians, we have decided to remove the on-ground segregation of this fleet on the ground using the color green. All our riders — both our regular fleet and our fleet for vegetarians, will wear the color red.
This means that the fleet meant for vegetarian orders will not be identifiable on the ground (but will show on the app that your veg orders will be served by the veg-only fleet).
This will ensure that our red uniform delivery partners are not incorrectly associated with non-veg food, and blocked by any RWAs or societies during any special days… our riders’ physical safety is of paramount importance to us.
We now realize that even some of our customers could get into trouble with their landlords, and that would not be a nice thing if that happened because of us.
Thanks, everyone for talking about this last night. You made us understand the unintended consequences of this rollout. All the love and all the brickbats were all so useful – and helped us get to this optimal point.
We are always listening, without unnecessary ego, or pride. We look forward to continue serving you.”
Source: Business Today
The Quick action from the Zomato team and their ability to listen to their customers’ responses saved them from losing their customer base. However, they should look at all complications before introducing an initiative that will affect not just their business but also the customers.
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