You can now order food on Facebook and it's called 'Order Food'
No need to eat that plain dry toast anymore, Mark.
Everyone's favorite social network launched its food delivery function across the U.S. on Friday. It is called "Order Food."
In a blog post, Alex Himel, Facebook's vice president of local, makes ordering food on Seamless sound like a byzantine adventure.
"Ordering food for takeout or delivery is supposed to be simple. That’s the point. But somehow it’s gotten complicated. First you need to decide what to eat, then you have to sift through a bunch of options and services," he wrote.
To fix this...uh...issue?... Facebook is introducing its own way to order food that seems exactly like Seamless and every other online food delivery service.
It will be great for people who look for food on Facebook, Himel wrote.
"Today, we’re taking the time out of finding what you want to eat by officially launching the ability to order food for pick-up or delivery, directly on Facebook. People already go to Facebook to figure out what to eat by reading about nearby restaurants, and seeing what their friends say about them. So, we’re making it even easier," he wrote.
The video below highlights how it works:
The upside of Facebook is that it combines a variety of services into its "Order Food" function, which could be legitimately helpful. It pulls in a variety of existing services, local restaurants, and large chains, "so you don’t have to search through multiple places to find what you’re looking for."
But if you're not sure what you want to eat, you're still on your own
"People will be able to browse restaurants near them that take orders via Delivery.com, DoorDash, ChowNow, Zuppler, EatStreet, Slice, and Olo, as well as directly from restaurants including Papa John’s, Wingstop, Panera, Jack in the Box, TGI Friday’s, Denny’s, El Pollo Loco, Chipotle, Five Guys and Jimmy John’s," Himel wrote.
Facebook had been testing its food delivery option in limited areas. On Friday, it's available across the U.S. on desktop as well as iOS and Android.
At least on desktop, "Order Food" wasn't exactly easy to find.
Skepticism aside, Facebook is an insanely big platform, and even a hard-to-find and rarely-used function like this can shift an entire industry. Facebook also joins Uber and Amazon as massive platforms that are looking to get more involved in food delivery.
Topics Facebook
Jason Abbruzzese is a Business Reporter at Mashable. He covers the media and telecom industries with a particular focus on how the Internet is changing these markets and impacting consumers. Prior to working at Mashable, Jason served as Markets Reporter and Web Producer at the Financial Times. Jason holds a B.S. in Journalism from Boston University and an M.A. in International Affairs from Australian National University.
